A tiny dot called Port St.Joe

Yes, Florida is still on my mind, and I keep my promises.  Today I’ll share the names of a few of  Florida’s out-of-the way locations.  My favorite is a tiny dot on the map called Port St. Joe.  It’s also called home.  I haven’t lived there in more years than I care to recall, but it will always be home.  There are no space shuttles cutting through the morning sky, no high rises, no Hemingways or Flaglers.  A small, unassuming place on Florida’s Gulf Coast, I know of at least three books--and there are more-- that have been written about this coastal community.  In 1947 Rubylea Hall penned The Great Tide, Louise M. Porter wrote The Lives of St. Joesph in 1975, and in 1988 The Chinaberry Album was published, my own tribute to Port St. Joe, AKA Bay Harbor in the novel.  

            Port St. Joe is a quiet place, a panhandle town nestled between Apalachicola and Panama City.  Its sugar-sand beaches are unparalleled, and its proximity to other resorts makes it doubly appealing.  Panama City, another lovely beach community, is less than 40 miles distance, and Apalachicola, a fishing village turned chic bed and breakfast resort, is a mere 23 miles.  Nearer to home are Indian Pass and Cape San Blas where beachfront homes can be rented or purchased.  A state park offers swimming, sand dunes and water birds. 

Moonlight strolls on St. Joe and Mexico beaches are a given, the only sound the breaking of the surf.  No glass high-rises mar the view.  No celebrity sightings.  Just the moon, the stars, and you.   Write about what you know, and I know those moonlight strolls and still cherish the memories of the boyfriends who shared them with me.

But more about Port St. Joe another day.  I’d like to dwell on the memory of those moonlight strolls a bit longer. 

Old Florida on My Mind

Welcome to my debut Florida blog.  Join me on the screened porch.  Pull up a rocker.   Make yourself at home, and I’ll tell you a little of what Florida means to me.  

            Florida is the Sunshine State and so much more.  It’s a glistening chameleon stretched beneath the sun, caressed on the West Coast by the Gulf of Mexico and on the East Coast by the Atlantic Ocean.  Florida is much more than 1,350 miles of coastline, much more than 663 miles of incredible beaches.  Florida is more than the top travel destination in the world--it’s a heartbeat, a memory, it’s Old South, New South and New York--Miami style.

 Florida is a land of ghosts.  Who doesn’t believe Papa still strolls the streets of Key West, that Fort Myers isn’t brighter because something of Thomas Edison is still there, and how could John Gorrie ever totally abandon Apalachicola where he developed mechanical refrigeration that would one day bring air conditioning to nearly every home in the Sunshine State and beyond.  Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings is a nearly palpable presence at Cross Creek.  Inside the humble dwelling where she entertained some of the most famous people of her generation, her dress is waiting, flung casually across the bed. Her car is in the carport, waiting.  Stirred by an unseen breeze, lacy moss sways, swooning in the ancient oaks.  Waiting. 

The scent of cooking vegetables drifts through her house, and it’s easy to believe she’s ready to entertain.  The women who work at this historic site can vegetables from the backyard garden, but the little fawn, Flag, is only a memory and doesn’t disturb the garden’s bounty.  And Ponce de Leon?  Does he still sip water from the Fountain of Youth in St. Augustine?  Doesn’t  Steven Foster wish he’d seen the Suwannee River? 

            Florida’s popular attractions are a given, but what of the hidden Florida, those out- of- the way spots that don’t roll off the tongue quite so easily?  Maybe next time.  After all, this is Florida where the living is easy and the rockers don’t squeak.

            Would love to hear from you.
http://www.oldfloridaonmymind.blogspot.com/
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