Bob was up and out early today, since he wanted to stake out a place in line to get into the White House. I joined him later, after I'd spent about an hour trying to find a reasonably close parking spot. Today was the coldest day yet - another beautiful blue-sky, but a keen, searching wind blowing across the Elipse from the Potomac. Still, lined up around the White House railings, we were shielded from the worst of the wind. And thank God, for it took us at least another 90 minutes before we made it inside the White House. And ... what an anticlimax. I mean, I suppose it was kind of a thrill to be in there, but you basically just get to shuffle your way through a few rooms. And there's not the barest hint of high-powered adminstration appointees rushing through the coridoors a la The West Wing. The best part of the deal is to see the presidential portraits, some of them famous paintings - Kennedy's and Jefferson's, amongst them.

We were somewhat lazy for the rest of the day. The highlights were lunch, a long nap, and dinner, although we did take a cold walk around the new FDR Memorial, which is a peaceful, meandering series of walls, rocks, statues and waterfalls.

I've been feeling a bit nostalgic today - thinking of all the other times I've come to Washington. The first few times, I came when I was in grad school in Philadelphia, and I drove up with my best friends, Niju and Guillermo. They were both doing PhDs which had given them lots of connections with the World Bank, so we would always be house-sitting a posh condominium near Dupont Circle, or a mansion in Chevvy Chase.

Niju, a beautiful, eccentric, fiendishly bright Indian woman, is one of the closest female friends I've ever had, and she'd gotten to know me at just the point in my life when I was starting to flower, as I came out of the closet. After I graduated, we both ended up working at the same research institute on campus, and we'd have lunch every day, and I'd usually be telling her all about my latest night out at the gay clubs: at that time in my life, I was going out almost every night, believe it or not!

Guillermo was from Mexico, an extremely talented, cultivated, charismatic guy who I, at first, greatly resented, as I felt he was trying to worm his way in between me and Niju. But, well, he could give something to Niju I couldn't, since he was straight. And before long, we became a trio of fast friends.

Our most significant trip to D.C. was also one of the strangest, for me. Niju cooked up a great Indian banquet for a motley collection of my friends, boyfriends and ex-love-interests who were all in Washington at that time. Everyone got there on time - Philip, my first boyfriend, a hilarious, suave Australian art-historian; Randy, my first big gay crush (never consummated, unfortunately), and some friends from the gay & lesbian grad-student association from Penn. Last to arrive was my new African-American boyfriend, Shawn. He arrived very late, apparently because he'd been stopped by the police while he drove round the exclusive streets of Chevvy Chase trying to find our house. Shawn was the first guy I'd ever been in love with, but he was the only person there who didn't have the cosmopolitan grad-school education that the rest of us shared. And being the only black guy too, his body language showed that he felt very out of place. But I guess we all got along fine.

That same trip, Shawn and I ended up moving into a hotel near Dupont Circle. We checked in late one night, with Niju along for the ride, and the guy at the desk was most suspicious that the three of us - a tall white guy, a black guy in a leather jacket, and a tall Indian woman - wanted a single room with a king-size bed! We all piled on the bed and spent the night playing strip-poker - I don't remember whose idea it was - probably Niju's! She was a very sexualized woman - she'd fondled me more than once, and she was very curious to see what Shaun looked like with no undies!

What I remember most fondly from that trip is that it was the first time that Shawn and I had spent a considerable period together. And it was where we really cemented our relationship. We spent hours talking with each other late into the night, as we lay in the darkness. I was so young - just twenty-three.

So I guess it's nice that my new boyfriend, Jed, is coming here tomorrow. It will be our first time away from home together, however brief (he can only stay one night). I'm certainly not the same person I was twelve years ago, though. I don't imagine we'll be playing strip-poker this time!