I Am In Love

And you’re thinking, yeah....what’s new?  We all know that but you are wrong!  I am in love with Florida, my home state.  I left here 43 years ago and I never dreamed it would take me this long to return.

Yes, it’s got a ridiculously high crime rate and the overdevelopment merits the saying, “the rape of Florida.” But, to me, it’s still home.  I think I’ll always be a Florida girl.

Steve and I arrived in Venice on the 1st of January.  Happy New Year to us!  We settled into our two bedroom condo with a golf course view from our screened-in back porch and headed to the pool.  It was nearly 80 degrees!  This is when I think global warming is perfectly suited for me.

I hate winter and every year I get worse.  Three years ago I escaped the Maryland winter that mirrored Buffalo, New York.  I ended up in Hilton Head, South Carolina freezing my buns off!  Seriously, it snowed in Hilton Head.  I was there for six weeks and could bear walking on the beach only one day.  Obviously, I needed to head further south.

I remember growing up in Orlando, where seasons were scant at best.  I was a huge reader as a child and pictured New England seasons.  It all seemed so idyllic until I moved there.  My first winter the snow fell on October 13th and I saw the ground again six months later.  SIX MONTHS!!!  I arrived with no coat, no boots, absolutely no sense when it came to driving in snow.  I didn’t even know where the defroster was in our new 1970 Honda Civic.  And, I was preggers with my first child.

No friends, no family.  Plenty of nausea and nostalgia.  I stayed 13 years and saw many pristine snowfalls and brilliant falls.  And, eventually, I made some of the best friends I will ever have in life and gave birth to a perfect little girl.  I started a career in education, became active in Democratic politics.

Often, we went to Cape Cod or the Long Island Sound to swim in the summer.  I even occasionally frequented Moonstone Beach, which was infamous for its daring nudity.  Once, I saw my neighbor two doors down.  I was horrified.  That was my last trip.  But, did you ever swim in that water???  It’s like jumping into a bathtub filled with ice cubes and I’m talking about the height of summer.  I really missed those Florida beaches on those days!

Every life has a yin and a yang...my husband and I parted and I began my own path, with plenty of bumps and bruises along the way that eventually took me to Maryland.
What a difference in the mid-Atlantic states!  Seasons still existed but the winters were shorter and milder and I could deal with it.

That was 1984.  Twenty eight years ago.  I hate the winters even in Maryland now.

We’re living in Florida for four months, through the end of April.  I am so glad to have a kindred spirit with me who loves this climate as I do.  The worst part of this experiment is leaving our combined eight children and nine grandchildren...soon to be 10 behind.  Every day we miss them.

But, in the morning, when we hear the squawks of the Sandhill cranes and the waterfall on the golf course, we pull on our shorts and tee-shirts and ask with a grateful heart, “What’s on the agenda today?”