It’s a Love/Hate Thing

I’ve been coming to the Hamptons since I was a kid. My parents used to drive us out on lazy Sundays in the fall and we’d get black-and-white ice cream sodas at the Bridgehampton Candy Kitchen, play on the beach, and come home with bushels of locally grown apples. My dad always hated the traffic, but it was so beautiful out there – the harmonious combination of lush woods, expansive farms, and long stretches of pristine white beaches – that I never seemed to mind sitting squished in the backseat between my brother and sister for the long car ride.

For the last five summers, I’ve gotten share houses with friends and have continued to enjoy the East End. But lately (especially on busy holiday weekends), I’ve been feeling a little turned off by the “Hampton-ness” of it all. I may be over a hundred miles away from bustling Manhattan, but Main Street in East Hampton during a holiday weekend is more congested and obnoxious than any intersection in New York City.

Yesterday, on my way to East Hampton Gym, it took me forty minutes to find parking and once I was inside (after paying the hefty $25 daily fee), the gym was so packed that all of the equipment was taken. Eventually an older woman with an insanely in-shape body, vacated a stair-master and I climbed on. I was about three minutes into my workout when I looked up and realized I was exercising right next to Karolina Kurkova. Trust me, there is nothing like being in the presence of a Victoria’s Secret model to make you go that “extra mile” so to speak. Plus, all the women in the gym were decked out in designer workout clothes, and I felt like a real rag-a-muffin in my decades-old t-shirt and Old Navy shorts.

Then on my journey back to my car I watched an older man (at least seventy-years-old) trying to back out of his coveted parking space near Citarella. A thirty-something man in a flashy Maserati pulled right up behind him to make sure he got the spot, but he was so close that the old man couldn’t back out. “Can you please back up a few feet so I can get out?” The old man asked.

The guy in the Maserati shouted back, “Go fuck yourself!”

I couldn’t believe it. How disgustingly rude, inappropriate and uncalled for. I was finally understanding why so many people say they hate the Hamptons (one good friend of mine actually owns a t-shirt that says “FUCK THE HAMPTONS!”)

That evening, a group of my friends and I boarded the ferry bound for Shelter Island so we could check out Andre Balaz’s hotel bar, Sunset Beach. The place was a mob scene. We had to park literally a mile away and when I asked the hostess if I could put my name in for a table she said, stone-faced, “Reservation?”

“No,” I said.

“Hotel guest?”

Again I said, “No.”

“Not in this lifetime.” Was her reply.

I called my husband to tell him that I, too, am starting to hate the Hamptons and never want to spend another summer out there again. “Why do we come here?” I implored. “We should just stay in Manhattan. It’s crowded and the people here are so rude and entitled and I HATE IT!”

He calmed me down, saying that it’s only because it’s a holiday weekend and that it will clear out soon enough. He also helped me to realize how ridiculous I was being, and urged me to gain some perspective. If my biggest problem is that I have trouble finding parking when I go to the gym on my weekend in the Hamptons, than I am a very lucky person indeed.

That night, some friends and I got a bottle of Pinot Noir, some cheese and bread and tiny grape tomatoes from the farmer’s market and had a picnic on the beach. The sun was setting, the sky was lavender, and the beach was surprisingly empty. As I sprawled out on the sand, staring out at the ocean, I got it. This is why we all come here. The trick is to avoid East Hampton town and Sunset Beach at all costs!