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/
http://www.ruthcchambers.com/