Camptown Ladies

by Mari SanGiovanni

  What a mess. When I looked up, I realized I had been seen long before the truck drove away, since Uncle Freddie had a bird’s eye view from the roof. Since he was alone up there, I wondered if he’d cleared the workers off the roof to spare his niece an audience for what may have been her worst day in her life. Before he leaned back over his spot on the roof, he looked down at me and nodded as if he had heard my thoughts, and said, “Abbiamo can’t scegliere chi amiamo.” I repeated this phrase over and over so I would remember it, and later, when I was home and could cry alone, I looked up the translation and found nothing was ever so true:

  “We can’t choose who we love.”

  The Dove Gaio Mangia was proving to be a continued success, especially after one of the first gay boys to visit the camp (who sported a porn name) turned out to be a freelance journalist, and wrote an article for Out And About Travel. As Lisa’s luck would have it, the article was picked up by the Associated Press and spread to at least a dozen newspapers.

  If a Lesbian Builds It, Will They Come? By Johnnie Rocket

  Camptown Ladies and its “sister” campground, Camp Camp, is probably the last place you would expect to find a four-star Italian restaurant, but that is exactly what I stumbled upon after joining friends at a campground that openly caters to a gay clientele. The campground’s owner, Lisa Santora, self-described “dykecoon,” runs the camp along with the rest of her colorful Italian family.

  Santora’s idea was simple: “I wanted to create a campground that was plush enough for the gay boys, while remaining rustic enough for us more hardy gals.” Add to this, all the warmth (and volume) you would expect from an Italian family welcoming their guests—Santora has come through on her promises.

  Upon arrival, Santora took us on a tour to show off the amenities. For the boys of Camp Camp, this includes bathrooms with marble sinks, a never-ending supply of plush, Ralph Lauren towels, and complimentary facial products. There is even a shower area large enough to host four of your closest friends. Lisa laughs when I ask about this and says, “I wanted to remind the boys of their high school gym days, when you had to pretend you weren’t looking.”

  Camptown Ladies women’s bathrooms feature a more rustic approach; with water-saver toilets and empty towel bars curtly labeled “Camptown Ladies is an eco-friendly Camp. Please provide your own towels.” Among the other charming oddities, there stands a Jenga-like tower of wood and beside it is a plaque dedicated to an aunt’s recent passing. Santora’s father stands guard over the wood and cheerfully admits to a rumor that his sister, known to the camp as Aunt Aggie, was “taken out” by the woodpile, which makes campers hesitant to buy the wood, and encourages them to bring their own.

  He also explained that his sister’s widower (affectionately called Uncle Freddie, by everyone at camp) has recently joined the construction crew, despite being in his seventies. Uncle Freddie can usually be found teaching Italian songs to the other crew members on the rooftops. The crew is lead by a female contractor—hired, according to Lisa Santora, not for her talent but strictly as “eye candy.”

  Other amenities include a Camp Store, which is comically segregated with a boy side and a girl side, and a built-in pool where the boys gather to gossip and work on their fabulous tans, and some of the ladies meet to do early-morning laps. Most of the women prefer to hang out at the weed-fringed pond, where you will find pairs of mommies closely monitoring their children’s every move, a place that Lisa Santora has dubbed Micro-Management Beach.

  Every Saturday morning there is a fly-fishing tournament, mostly for the ladies. It’s called “A Rottweiler Runs Through It,”because the women are encouraged to bring their dogs but asked to leave the children back at the campsite. Lisa Santora holds all the fly-fishing records, and she teases her brother Vince: “Despite his supple wrist, he never could get the hang of it, even though he’s forced to fly fish because he’s petrified of worms. Go figure.”

  The boys have made the refurbished teen rec hall the It place to go summer clubbing when the restaurant magically transforms from food to frolic. The gay boys, some in drag, have been known to put on impromptu shows, laden with Abba and Bette Midler songs. The lesbians (and a fair amount of straight folks) are lured here by the food but stay to watch the show, hauling beer coolers on wheels, with small children hitching rides. Teenagers watch the show from the safety of the woods.

  Lisa Santora offers a pass for non-camping visitors to experience her restaurant, Dove Gaio Mangia (Italian slang for: “Where Gays Eat”). If camping is not your thing, I strongly suggest purchasing a One Gay Pass, as the restaurant should not be missed. Authentic Italian cooking is served up in a beautifully decorated dining hall—the work of flamboyant friend, and self-appointed event coordinator, Eddie Stella. The food is so heavenly, and seconds and leftovers so strongly encouraged, that you will quickly forgive the lesbian-style customer service. There is none; it’s strictly buffet-style and clean up after yourself, or be chastised openly by chef Lisa.)

  Be advised to get there early, as the restaurant has two sittings every evening and word has leaked out in town that this is the best place in the tri-state area to get an all-you-can-eat, four-star Italian dinner for $8.00 (or whatever you chose to donate)—and kids always eat free. Santora offers a Double-Dyke-Discount for any family sporting two mommies. Nobody seems to mind the discrimination, and she says she does it because most male heads of household have higher incomes. Lisa’s answer to anyone who may brave a rare complaint? “I tell them they should go to f***ing Disney World, where it’s straight except for once a year, and that here, every day is Gay Day. Next year I’m considering having a straight week, with a parade where the straight couples can pull their kids on their Coleman coolers, and the gays can stand and wave at them from the sidewalks. It’ll be awesome.”

  The morning after his date with Erica, I watched Vince as he sat at the kitchen table reading the newspaper. He was laughing his way through the Camptown Ladies article; grateful he only got hit with the worm comment. When he finished reading it, he looked at me and said, “You look like crap ever since you spent that night with Lorn.”

  “And you kind of look happy.”

  He put down the paper. “Don’t worry, I’m being realistic. I know this may not work.”

  “Knowing that doesn’t stop you from being crushed,” I said, and Vince nodded and we both sat in silence.

  Finally, he asked me, “What’s going on with you and Lorn?”

  “I ended it. Being with her was just sad.”

  “Because you still love her,” he said.

  “Because I don’t.” I excused myself from the table, before he had a chance to give me details about his date with Erica.

  Twenty-Seven

  She Shoots, She Scores!

  The next few weeks, Erica and Vince were scarcely seen at camp. When Lisa would ask Vince how things were going, he would decline to answer. But I saw the old, cheerful Vince was gradually coming back and I was both worried and happy for him, despite the fact that I had barreled through the same turnstile to Depression-land just as he was exiting, and all because of the same woman.

  When Vince was not off the campsite with Erica, he was spending time with Katie’s little boy, Buddy. Vince had become fascinated by the shy little kid and would trek once a day to the far side of the camp to Katie’s trailer to see if he could borrow her son.

  Vince would invent goofy games that reminded me of the games we used to play in our backyard when we were kids. Vince circled the entire camp with the child riding in the back of his red wagon while Buddy pretended Vince was a horse. I recognized this one particular game as Lisa’s since Vince’s bad coaching of an English accent had Buddy yelling out warnings to the campers that a bubonic plague had hit camp, and that after a fortnight they would be allowed to line up for rations of beans and towels. To Buddy’s delight, a few of the campers played along and shouted back to them, “When will this plague be over?” and “Tell me sir, how can a guy get so
me extra beans?” Vince coached Buddy to yell back to the Mayor, “No extra beans! Your wife says you eat too much!” On Buddy’s second pass by the camp store, Lisa ran over to hand the boy a long, thin tree branch with instructions to use it on his Vince as a horse whip, but Katie put an end to that after the third lap.

  Since Vince and Erica were never at camp together, I worried if Vince sensed there had been something between us. If they were avoiding camp, I was pathetically hopeful it was Erica that was controlling this, that maybe she knew I wasn’t strong enough to face seeing them together. Every morning I braced myself to see them together, and was grateful for every day that I was spared the sight.

  I tried to find joy in the return of my brother’s boyish smile and the bounce that was back in his step, and most days I could. But I would also get up in the middle of the night and wander down the hallway at the condo to see if my brother had come home. I usually found his door left open and that his bed had not been slept in, and my heart would ache at the thought of them together. I was grateful they never stayed together at the condo, but that didn’t stop me from staying awake night after night, staring at the ceiling, knowing they were together. She was his first, I would remind myself. But then the thought would creep in as I slept: was she, really?

  While I was no longer assisting Erica with any construction projects, my Uncle Freddie was becoming a roofing expert. It was common to see him do Erica’s signature moonwalk and he had gotten so skilled at it that she even let him walk along the new clay tile roofs, when she never let me do that. When I watched him, I had no idea if the pit in my stomach was worry that a man in his seventies was walking high on top roofs, or simply that the roof walking reminded me of her. Everything reminded me of her. Just reading a random reference to California in the newspaper would send me into a funk, as I remembered all the celebrity house projects we’d worked on together.

  Several mornings I would see her truck slow, then pass by the entrance of the campground, as if she had decided at the last minute not to come. Later in the day, she would show up, but only to check on her crew or to move a piece of equipment to work in another part of the camp—whichever part I was not in, it seemed. Other mornings, my heart would lurch into my chest when I saw her truck parked in the camp, but often she would arrive just to bark a few orders or check the work of her crew from the previous afternoon before she was pulling out of the camp again, sometimes not coming back for several days.

  Today I especially hated myself. Vince had stopped by to say he was taking off for several days for a bachelor party in Vegas with some college friends. I sighed with relief and then hated myself for it. I hated that his being away from Erica made me feel stupidly hopeful, like she would somehow be mine in some small way while he wasn’t around. More evil than that, most of my relief came from knowing he would not be around to hold and touch her, if only for a few days.

  I hated myself.

  Lisa knew there was something wrong with me, and while she couldn’t put her finger on it, that didn’t stop her from guessing every chance she got. Was I sick of the campground? Was I secretly back with Lorn? To all of this I would say no, and offer no more. She gave me a little space, but she would still be observing me, that damned eyebrow of hers lifted in constant suspicion, and I knew it was only a matter of time before she’d find out. I even toyed with telling her, but I knew I couldn’t. How could I tell her I was the sibling who had broken the trust between the three of us? Our entire lives, it had always been the three of us; we’d been able to count on each other for as long as I could remember, and I now would do anything to keep up the charade that I had not breached this.

  Vince’s Vegas trip was bad timing for the camp, since it came over the long Labor Day weekend, which would start with the parade and end with a bonfire to signal the official end of the camping season. Camptown Ladies and Camp Camp would stay open until the end of September, but already some of the full season campers had started to winterize their trailers and pack away their less hardy decorations. Vince was gone and when I arrived Friday morning at camp, I saw that Erica’s truck was already there, but aside from Uncle Freddie, there was no sign of her or her crew.

  Lisa caught me staring at Erica’s truck, as my brain reenacted the kiss I’d had with Erica, and I started when she spoke. “Since Vince is away, I asked Erica if she and her crew could stay for the weekend to help us run the bonfire.”

  I didn’t know if my gut reaction was panic or pure joy. I could no longer tell the difference. All I knew was that I felt alive for the first time in weeks, knowing Erica would be again spending her time here. My blood beat in my veins again at last, and I may have even smiled, before it occurred to me to turn away from Lisa, who was studying my face. I pretended to search the trees for new signs of Gypsy Moth invasions.

  “What the fuck is going on with you and her?” Lisa said, grabbing my arm to stop me from walking. I had to look at her then, and in that second, I knew that she knew.

  “Nothing,” I said, and even if my voice hadn’t cracked, I knew I was fucked.

  “Oh my God!” Lisa said, then she lowered her voice, “Is something going on with you and Erica?”

  I shook my head no, but my eyes had filled and I knew that Lisa would never be convinced otherwise.

  She interrogated me, “What happened between the two of you?”

  “Nothing. Nothing is happening . . . now,” I said.

  Lisa was stunned, and I realized then she had made a wild guess, and was reeling from the shock that she had been right. Horrified, she said, “You can’t be that stupid.”

  “And cruel,” I said.

  Lisa muttered to herself, “Vince obviously has no idea, since he sneaks off to see her every minute. Is this why he’s afraid to tell us he’s seeing her again?”

  “He doesn’t know, he won’t know—not ever,” I said. “I stopped it from happening, it won’t ever happen.”

  Lisa’s eyes bulged from her head. “Are you telling me she feels the same way about you?”

  “I’m sure she doesn’t anymore,” I said. “Not after I told her I still loved Lorn. Look, Vince is happy, so whatever she thought she wanted from me, she found it again with him. She realized this wasn’t real for her.”

  “But it’s real for you,” Lisa said. “You’re in love with her.”

  “No.” I shook my head, but then stopped, hopeless to deny it. “I’ll get over it. I got over Lorn, I’ll get over this.”

  Lisa surprised me by saying, “That was different. Lorn was wrong for you.” We stood together for a long time, letting that sink in. Then she said, “I know I don’t have to tell you this would destroy him.”

  She didn’t have to tell me.

  The parade on Saturday was a big hit and a welcome distraction for Lisa and me. The gay boys all dressed up, Mardi Gras style, while the lesbians opted instead to dress up their dogs and march them through the camp, following the flowing feather boas of the gay boys. Lisa, of course, led the parade. She’d bought an authentic English military uniform from the Army Navy store in Province-town (the uniform still smelled like the store) and she carried a large baton, which she raised up and down with moves less like a baton and more like a barbell, keeping everyone marching in time. There were so many lively sights to see—the gays, the colors, the children on decorated bikes, the dogs in costume—that I was able to forget myself for a while. That, plus, as usual, Erica was nowhere to be found.

  Hours later, just as I began to wonder if she had possibly joined Vince in Vegas, Erica showed up with a small crew, including Uncle Freddie, to begin the difficult negotiations with Dad over the wood for the bonfire. I could see by Dad’s conflicted body language that his instincts were to throw himself onto his tower to protect it. At the same time, he knew it made no sense. Thanks to Dad’s rumor that a tumbling woodpile was the cause of Aunt Aggie’s demise, the tower had hardly been touched all season. In fact, parents made children take a wide path around it to get to the camp
store. Dad was pleased he’d kept his tower relatively intact, but now he looked like he was circled by a pack of vultures. They were closing in, and this was Woody’s last stand.

  Erica spotted me approaching, but she continued her campaign for the wood, talking to my father as if he was a special needs child, a tactic that occasionally worked. “Mr. Santora, it’s a beautiful tower, but I know you could build an even better one next season,” she said.

  Dad answered, “It would be fine with me, but how would Freddie feel? We dedicated the tower to his wife, my sister Aggie, and I wouldn’t dream of—”

  “Torch it!” Uncle Freddie interrupted from behind him, “Aggie would have loved to see a bonfire. I would like to think if we build it right, she’ll see it from up there.”

  I was not completely convinced Aunt Aggie didn’t have a long layover before heading “up there,” but I agreed with Uncle Freddie and said, “Dad, we can take off the plaque and dedicate the camp store to her memory instead. Makes sense since she spent a lot of time in the store.”

  I heard Lisa whisper behind me, “She friggin’ croaked in there.”

  Dad showed signs of weakening but would not give up without a fight. He said, “What if I ordered more wood for the bonfire, and left this tower intact, then we would be all set for next year.” Then he smiled as if it was all settled.

  Gentle was not Erica’s natural state, but she was nothing if not savvy. She paced around the tower and Dad watched her as if she was a giant alien termite, circling his nest of helpless wood babies. Erica turned to me and said, “Even if we did use the wood from this tower, I still haven’t decided the best way to build the biggest bonfire, while still keeping it as safe as possible.”

  Though she didn’t look at me, it was the first time she had talked to me in weeks, and I was thrown by it, but I recovered to help her bait Dad. I said, “Don’t look at me. You’re the Bobbi The Builder. I have no idea how to make a bonfire.”