I knew from our extensive conversations, in addition to his interest in photography, Jon really enjoyed seeing new sights, especially if they provided great photo opportunities. I’d sent him a list of some of the Coachella Valley’s most popular attractions. He wanted to see and do them all. Unfortunately that would have taken weeks, if not months, and, as it was now officially summer, some of these destinations, like Joshua Tree National Park, might be way too hot to enjoy.
Saturday we headed to Palm Springs most popular attraction, the Aerial Tramway, which features two rotating tramcars that carry passengers on a two-and-a-half-mile journey up to the 8,500 foot level on the eastern face of Mt. San Jacinto.
We descended from the rocky outcropping the tram station is perched upon, into San Jacinto State Park where we roamed the Desert View trail for hours, stopping at each of its overlooks to take dozens of photographs. We took pictures of the magnificent views, each other, and of course selfies, mostly of the two of us together.
At six feet two inches tall, Jon had by far the longer reach instantly making him the designated “selfie stick,” as he referred to himself. While we trekked the high forest between overlooks we talked and talked some more mostly about our lives, loves. and past experiences in more depth and detail than ever before.
By the time we’d reached the third of the five overlooks on the trail, I had become increasingly aware of the number of times Jonny had made me the focus of a picture.
After seeing a couple of the portraits he made of me, I told him there was one picture in particular I would like to have. I asked him to take my iPhone and snap a shot of the two of us as we kissed.
Without hesitation, he positioned us at the edge of an overlook, held up my iPhone, framed the shot, leaned in toward me, and, just as our lips met, he snapped the picture. He put his arm down but we didn’t separate. We just stood there, our lips joined for a few moments more staring into one another’s eyes.
Griselda fainted. This time Brain had to let her hit the floor because it took every bit of his strength and all his effort to keep me on my feet as my knees were buckling under me, and the last thing he wanted to have was for me to fall over the edge of a cliff.
But that wasn’t the most amazing thing that happened that day up on the mountain.
From our very first stop on the Desert View Trail I noticed something heart-warmingly delightful about Jonny. An amazing, child-like sense of awe and wonder came over him every time he began taking in a new scenic view, composing a photo, checking out the light, and framing each and every shot, which of course turned out brilliantly.
Like most men, Jonny never spoke of his feelings, but at these moments a unmistakable sense of joy and happiness came flowing out of him like a gently rolling river. Standing beside that river of joy was blissfully infectious. The happier he seemed to be, the more lighthearted and at peace I felt, especially when he looked, eyes sparkling, directly at me.
This phenomenon was so delightful to experience and be around, I instinctively began taking a series of shots mostly from behind or to the side of Jonny as he was composing an image.
On the drive home, I recalled having experienced this remarkable display of genuine emotion before. It was during our conversation about his teenage years. That was when Griselda first referred to our experiencing what she called the cathedral of his soul.
But that wasn’t the most amazing thing that happened that day up on the mountain.
“I’m putting a bunch of the pics we took together as sort of a travelogue for Facebook,” I said to Jonny back at my apartment later that afternoon.
“That’ll be great,” he said while fiddling with his iPhone. “Let me know when you’ve uploaded them.”
I very much wanted to include the selfie of us kissing, but I realized the impression it could give people and I knew I couldn’t just unilaterally post it without letting Jonny know first.
“That pic of us kissing,” I said hesitantly, “I’d like to use it in the album.”
“That’s fine,” he responded without taking his gaze away from his phone.
“If I do that,” I continued just as uncertainly, “I just don’t want to give people…that is people might jump to conclusions. I mean, they’re gonna assume what they want to anyway.”
“So, what if they do,” he replied nonchalantly. “Go ahead, post it.”
And so I did.
After enjoying a couple of unintentionally blackened steaks from my new grill, we continued our dinner conversation in the kitchen while cleaning up and storing leftovers, of which, after feeding a 278 lb powerlifter, there weren’t many.
Both of Jon’s previous two relationships had been with Americans. The first, during the US prelegal same-sex marriage days, was to a systems engineer who eventually moved to Canada so that they could be together. It ended, due in part, to resentfulness and miscommunication fueled by Jon’s attractiveness to other men. The trauma of divorce set in motion a re-examination of his life, which led Jonny to leave everything in his eastern Canadian life, pull up stakes, move to British Columbia, and to almost completely withdraw from online life.
I told him I was sorry he’d had such a rough time of it, but at the same time I was grateful that by the time I’d gotten to know him, he, like me, was past our previous relationship issues.
“My job, should things continue to develop between us,” I told him, “would not be to tell you who you could and couldn’t see, my job would be to do everything I could to make you forget about all those other men.”
He looked at me, smiled warmly and said, “What a wonderful thing to say.” And with that we were off to the bedroom.
Discretion necessitates refraining from details here. Let’s just say I was correct in my assumption that I could use more practice before taking on as intimate an undertaking as this. Nevertheless, a few miscalculations on my part aside, a good time seemed to be had by all. At the very least, it was a climactic end to the day.
On Sunday we observed the gay religious ceremonial practice of brunch at one of my favorite diners, Rick’s, where my favorite server, Addy, also fell under the spell of Canada’s latest secret weapon.
“He’s wonderful,” she said echoing virtually everyone’s assessment of my adorably handsome Canadian guest.
We spent the remainder of that afternoon touring the Palm Springs Art Museum. Jonny was awe struck, by the architecture, layout and collections of artistic works. We both were nearly dumbstruck when we discovered an older couple, not an unusual sight in Palm Springs, sitting on a gallery bench seemingly taking in an exhibit, turned out to be two amazingly life-like sculptures.
We dubbed them, Muriel and Edgar.
We dubbed them, Muriel and Edgar.
Jonny’s sense of delight wasn’t confined to the exhibits alone. While he would momentarily immerse himself in the task at hand, that of choosing just the right angle, just the right light, and just the right distance for each shot, he would return his attention to me, position me for a picture or take selfies of the two of us and always with that huge broad smile of his.
Each time he did this, Griselda would attempt to swoon but before she could utter a single “Ah,” Brian would raise a hand so as to cut her off and sternly say, “Canadian,” to preclude her from jumping to any conclusions as to what Jonny’s intentions and motivations might be.
After Jonny had returned to Ontario I assembled one last Facebook album made up of some of the shots I’d taken of him taking pictures. Borrowing from the Stephen Sondheim, James Lapine musical, Sunday In The Park With George, I titled the album Color And Light and paraphrased one of Sondheim’s lyrics, which I used as a comment for the album.
“So much love in his words… forever with his colors… how Jonny looks… he can look forever… what does he see? …his eyes so dark and shiny… so careful… so exact…”
The only change I made in Sondheim’s original lyric was exchanging the name George for Jonny. It was if Sondheim had written these words expressly for me to be able to convey some of the joy and wonder I experienced.
Edited by
Kenneth Larsen
Next Up: The L-Bomb
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