Sukkah On United Street

One of the unusual aspects of knowing nothing about Judaism and then waking up one day married to a Jew is that you discover tons of stuff that much to your surprise is the root of your own Christian religion. They never taught me in school that habits and usages of the Catholic Church are based in practices of Judaism -keeping a light burning in the sanctuary, covering heads (men in Judaism, women in Catholicism as was) odd dietary restrictions and so forth. Building temporary shelters to celebrate holidays is not one of them. Jews do that and there is the one such symbolic shelter at the synagogue on United Street in Key West.

I'm not hugely familiar with the customs of assorted Jewish holidays as my wife counts herself a cultural Jew and she also married a non-Jew which is not viewed any more kindly by her lot than it used to be by mine. We had a religious wedding and finding a suitable rabbi was beyond us so we used an ecumenical priest who managed to get into trouble with his Bishop for marrying us. That negative experience put the last nail in the coffin of my Catholicism. My wife had kosher grandparents (separate fridges which sounds like a lot of work for a butter fingers like me) and she can recite the Hebrew prayers, which when translated sound remarkably similar to the Latin mumbles I grew up with, but we are two people straddling two cultures viewed askance by the hardliners on each side. From a distance I do enjoy the inexplicable rites and habits that are never questioned by their adherents. And you are looking in these pictures at the oldest organized Jewish community in Florida which is noteworthy for Key West, once Florida's wealthiest city and Perhaps stillmost integrated.

Sukkot is variously translated as the Festival of Tabernacles which is apparently inaccurate as this isn't a traditional "tabernacle" in the Christian sense. The alternative is Festival of Booths which sounds accurate perhaps but decidedly odd for a religious get together. A booth is, yes, temporary, as required here but Festival of Booths sounds like a gathering of temporary dust catcher merchants on Whitehead Street. Far better the experts explain in astounding detail and more than one language: Judaism 101: Sukkot

And this point leapt out at me:

Many Americans, upon seeing a decorated sukkah for the first time, remark on how much the sukkah (and the holiday generally) reminds them of Thanksgiving. This may not be entirely coincidental: I was taught that our American pilgrims, who originated the Thanksgiving holiday, borrowed the idea from Sukkot. The pilgrims were deeply religious people, living their lives in accordance with the Bible. When they were trying to find a way to express their thanks for their survival and for the harvest, they looked to the Bible for an appropriate way of celebrating and found the fall harvest festival of Sukkot. This is not the standard story taught in public schools today (that a Thanksgiving holiday is an ancient English pagan custom that the Pilgrims brought over), but that story doesn't fit with the Pilgrims' strict biblical views.

Lovely isn't it? The older we get the less truth we find, smoke and mirrors, deception and speculation. If I get too old and spend too much time wondering about what else isn't as we always thought it was, my head will explode.

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Ambushed On Front

I read some profoundly gruesome news in the paper this week, and it had nothing to do with Ebola, rather it had to do with Fantasy Fest, the witches' brew of nudity and drunkenness and financial largess that starts next week. As usual the bacchanalia is filling up the hotel rooms in town except this year there are about 500 fewer rooms than usual as the chain hotels on the Boulevard are still under reconstruction. According the tourism folks all the overflow is spilling up the Keys toward Big Pine. Fantastic! I will be sharing my Fantasy Fest commutes with a bunch of over excited intoxicated nude zombie car drivers all next week.

These sorts of considerations don't interest my dog one whit, especially when some brain dead consumer left a paper bag full of last night's dinner on the ground in a parking lot. Clean up was gross but fortunately the dumpster was but a few paces away. Which prompts the question: why was the bag left on the ground in the first place? Key West has the capacity to be stunningly beautiful, but somehow the people here manage to let the place down.  Cheyenne doing her part to clean up this town:

 Lazy Way Lane is closed for the nonce, which news is about as welcome to the businesses on that little street as the news of hotel guests commuting highway one is to me.  Cheyenne was tugging the leash so the photo is not as crisp as I'd have liked but I think the sense of it is abundantly clear: please come and spend money.

Pritam Singh's latest parking lot-free development is well underway, a resort of magnificent opulence no doubt going by the curious name of "The Marker" as though a building in the tedious "Key West style" in any way resembles a navigational buoy. 96 rooms and parking for two dozen cars is a style that will leave it's mark, no doubt about that.

 Lazy Way Lane has rather lost its own "Key West Style" as seen previously on this blog:

Nowadays its more an extension of the construction site. Doubtless the former eccentric glory of the waterfront lane will return, though I wonder how this place and  Schooner Wharf Bar will make out with this hotel looming over them. 

The world was backwards: looking west and seeing a gorgeous sunrise over the Galleon Resort?

It was broad daylight by the time Cheyenne got us all the way to Mallory Square. She loves this walk and has a routine she likes to follow, criss-crossing the streets, checking her favorite spots, And she comes across a coconut vendor. Hmm. Nothing edible, time to move on, nothing to see here.

People ask if Cheyenne is friendly and when I say "NO" the judgement is that, de facto, she is therefore aggressive. Not at all, she is simply not friendly, not interested in you or your dogs or anything. She is interested in what she is interested in. Which is not to say others aren't interested in her. She amassed a following of very interested chickens in Mallory Square, did my fierce Labrador.

She ignores mockingbirds when they dive bomb us so chickens don't stand a chance of drawing her attention. A puddle on the other hand is a thing of beauty, a fatal attraction for an overheated elderly Labrador on a long walk.

"Hey! Is that Cheyenne?" Well you have to give the man kudos for running me down and confronting me on a public sidewalk. He was actually very friendly and said he was Bob from Connecticut who after years of hanging at out the Galleon (not with the louche GarytheTourist a loiterer at the Galleon of ill repute) decided to set up house in Key West. August is too hot for a temperate man from New England so only the hardiest of us  can apparently live here year round. 

He blends in rather nicely wouldn't you say? A red backpack on Front Street and not a snowbird.

And we end where we started, with Key West's cozy relationship with trash. This time in the water.

Not the sort of crystal clear waters you ache to swim in, are they? I pick up after my dog, but who picks up after the people?

The Fuel Dock

It's that lunch break thing, finding myself with my Bonneville downtown at 2:30 in the morning, the Bonneville purring sweetly and me not sleepy enough to want to lay down on a cot for an hour in the storeroom. So I take myself and my motorcycle down to the waterfront for the best breezes to cool the 84 degree night.

It's October and it must be cooling off Up North. I know this because a selection of northern tags is showing up on the front of vehicles around the Lower Keys. Down here in the murk of a sub tropical endless summer it remains warm and occasionally muggy despite the strong easterly breezes. Sleeping on a boat without the hatches open would be trying for me, but this Catalina 30 was buttoned up with only the companionway wide open.

I keep thinking sudden summer squalls are done but they aren't; I got drenched riding home Sunday morning as I had left my waterproofs at home and I greeted my dog, impatient on the deck, soaked from head to toe. She was hopping around like a puppy while I slowly got changed into dry clothes for her walk. Then she got even more indignant when heavy rain stopped play and we had to go home. I got wet a second time sheltering her with my umbrella as we climbed the stairs under a torrential downpour. In fact she wouldn't step out under the rain unless I offered her the cover of my umbrella. I get the feeling Cheyenne never had it so good.

In the South Atlantic and in the West Indies there is some hurricane activity which is not surprising as the season for cyclones doesn't end until November 30th when tropical waters are supposed to have cooled off a bit. However at this stage it looks more like heavy rain for the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico and Hispaniola but no disturbances for us. Suits me.

I like the absence of drama on still waters, no waves, no crashing surf, no white frothy spume bursting over cliffs and rocks. Limpid, mirror-like flat water suits my taste. These harbor waters are considered historic because they were once the center of trade and maritime traffic in Key West. This was part of the coastline from Mallory Square where ships dropped off their cargoes. In the 20th century Key West Bight was the place where commercial fishing boats docked. The term "bight" means an indentation in a coastline with suitable protection for anchoring. Nowadays it's a place where the leisure industry makes a living serving amateurs and party boats and sunset cruises and the like. The shrimpers are banished to the working class docks on Stock Island.

Turtle Kraals overlooks the dinghy docks where boaters park their "station wagons" that bring them to shore from their boats anchored far out in the harbor. I don't miss those days as much as you would expect. A motorcycle is more efficient and arguably more fun... The restaurant's name is derived from the delightful practice, now happily banned of storing turtles in these watery "corrals" (known in South African Afrikaans as "kraals") until they were pulled out and butchered horribly while helpless on their backs. Our ancestors were not always charming people. And why they used the term kraal instead of corral I couldn't say.

Nowadays the stores that serve the Bight sell dust catchers and more useful things like bait and bottled air for divers and all the sundries needed by temporary boaters.

The Half Shell Raw Bar much enjoyed by visitors...

...and my Triumph Bonneville much enjoyed by me.

Can't wait for my ride home. Darkness, zombie cars to pass, a happy Labrador to greet me.

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The Meadows Dawn

Next month we go to winter time when dark mornings are rolled back a bit and dark evenings are rolled in as we fall back onto standard  time. Bummer. Cheyenne has been enjoying cool breezes and lower humidity but during the day highs still manage to get into the mid to upper 80s, so early morning walks are her preference. Princess rides on her throne in the back of the car.

Its at times like these, as a full moon hanging provocatively over the city that I wish I had a telephoto camera. The little white disc doesn't convey the full emotion. Of course underground wires would help too.

I have never been moved to be an Elk or a Shriner or a Moose so I am not completely sure what goes on inside these clubs but whatever exactly it is they have a great deal of room in which to do it.

 Early morning is the time to be out, and not just if you wear a fur coat. Clear skies, cool winds, no traffic on Ashe Street.

On seeing this sign in The Meadows I wondered if my Labrador might get consideration from incautious drivers...

Motorcycles, glorious daily riders of all shapes and sizes. Another reason to enjoy living in this year round riding climate. Even given the absence of twisty roads.

 The Key West commute, or the school bus variant if you prefer:

Power walking is more of a winter activity around here when people show up from more energetic parts of the country and stride about waving their arms and wearing suitably energetic clothing. They make me feel inadequate ambling around following my slow paced dog. 

 The Metropolitan Community Church on Petronia Street. God has a lot of adherents in Key West you'd imagine from all the churches. I sometimes wonder if their deity is rather more slack than the one I grew up with who eschewed gluttony and sloth and all those noisome vices that seem to thrive here alongside all the many churches. Perhaps its just a noisy few propagating vice and the silent majority populating the churches. I live in the county so I am exempt on both counts.

Kawasaki KZ 650 B2A

I can often be heard moaning about the lack of variation among the motorcycles seen on South Florida roads - old men on Harleys going slow and young men on sport bikes hammering their way recklessly through heaps of zombie car drivers...

I exaggerate. A little for effect you understand but by and large I wait a long time between sightings of Ducatis and BMWs and the last time I saw a Moto Guzzi, Methuselah was a young man. 

This motorcycle came out as a middleweight alternative to the top of the line 900cc Z1 with which Kawasaki had dominated the ranks of the Universal Japanese Motorcycle stakes- the contest between four cylinder machines that started with Honda's CB750. According to the press the KZ650 was a step forward in the right direction with a decent chassis and good road handling combined with the sophisticated and reliable modern engine. In my book the middle weights always seem to end up being better rides than the flagship bikes built to impress. A generalization perhaps but there is a lot of truth to it.

So I got unreasonably excited when I saw this fine example of a 1978 motorcycle in the style of my youth parked, not for sale, on Cudjoe Key. Clearly the owner cherishes it, as it was locked firmly to a nearby tree with a substantial cable.

Sloppy Joes

It took a fundraiser (for my colleague Eric) but I was seen in a Lower Duval bar today. No drinks; they don't approve if you show up in dispatch with alcohol on your breath.