A Tryst in Puerto Vallarta

Lots of pics and highlights from my trip

How do you feel about cheap souvenirs? I’m at my gate inside the Puerto Vallarta airport trying to decide if I should walk back to the gift shop to buy one. They’re clever here and have designed the terminal so that everyone must walk by racks of T-shirts, keychains, magnets, the typical things. I had my eye on a Christmas ornament made of orange yarn, and now I have this tiny fantasy of starting collection of ornaments from my travels. Imagine that twenty years from now.

It’s the kind thing I wish I had thought to start long ago, but I guess it’s never too late. This is an era of new beginnings and reconfiguring traditions, after all. I went back and got the ornament.

I’ll admit, one week ago, I was pretty nervous to fly to Puerto Vallarta for what was going to be my first-ever solo work trip. I’ve had similar trips many times over the last few years, influencer trips focused on capturing content and promoting a hotel or destination or even, a couple times, a vehicle, but that was always with Beau. Even in unfamiliar places and with people I’d never met, I always had him to lean on. This time I was going into it completely solo—I knew nobody. And while I felt thrilled and validated to be offered my first solo gig, this was also a little out of my wheelhouse, because it was a modeling job.

I’m comfortable on camera but I am absolutely not a model. I’m confident in how I look, too, but at the end of the day I am just a dork with muscles. When I looked up the other guys who would be with me on the shoot I felt immediately so out of my element. These guys were M-O-D-E-L-S.

I also felt a slight concern that I was being tapped for the job exactly because of my breakup hubbub. The brand that hired me was Tryst Hotels, an LGBTQ-centered vacation destination with a flirty-to-dirty brand identity. I felt a little crazy and big headed for the inkling, but I wondered if they might be capitalizing on my notorious relationship status to hint at a story of letting loose and feeling wild and free after the end of a long relationship.