Summerland Key

I grumble to anyone who will listen, and there aren't many left who care, that y days off are marked by rain and heavy gray skies. Wednesday went exactly that way. Boo hiss. Rusty didn't care, he ran and splashed ahead of me.

I was surprised to see a tree stump in the path looking like a cow skull. I knew it wasn't anything so esoteric as the hound rushed on by without a second glance. And from there we moved from Georgia O'Keefe to the Henri Cartier Bresson moment, decisively.

The French photographer who died five or six years ago created a belief in the value of the "decisive moment" in photography, exemplified by one his most famous pictures, a fat man in a hat and raincoat jumping a puddle in 1932. Cartier Bresson said later it was a moment captured when he stuck his camera through a gap in a fence and he simply squeezed the button. I saw my decisive moment coming and this was the middle of three attempts. Rusty continued to ignore me naturellement.

When first I saw these pipes organized into a battlefield I also saw a lot of spent paintball ammunition on the ground but these days it seems the war is won as the graffiti are fading and the ground is clean. I hope the right side came out on top.

There is an awful lot of cement out here in the abomination of desolation. Once upon a time the mangrove swamps were seen as useless and fit only to be used as a dumping ground. I've stumbled across vehicles of every description along the trails and around here I have photographed a gently decaying cement mixer of all things.

Graffiti mostly looks like scribble with the occasional obscenity thrown in to shock but every now and again one wonders why the artist hasn't gone on to greater things.

I found a courtyard lifted from the lost city of Atlantis, or possibly a pile of construction debris laid out symmetrically for some obscure reason.

Bits of rubber, light poles, cement and wires. It's all here decomposing.

It was my day off so rain threatened all the time we were out but after an hour it was time to go home even though the threatened rain had held off. 

This area must have been a gravel pit before it became a dumping ground. It used to be legal to dig holes in the mangroves and remove gravel for construction before anyone figured out you couldn't have fish without mangroves. So now they are protected and dumping is not allowed.

Highway One runs next to the not so pretty but probably hurricane proof block that is for sale on Summerland Key. It's right next to the highway but it has some space surrounded by a high wall right on a  canal. Sounds ideal for an unsocial millionaire who likes traffic noise.

The weather is become hot and sticky already so Rusty has adopted a summer posture of a slow pace, much sniffing and frequent dunks in murky warm water. He got his bath when we got home and he remained annoyed at me for about thirty minutes after he escaped the towel rub down and scampered off to seek solace from my wife.

A seaplane.  Not fascinating, I know but I find them to be the most interesting planes I see around here. Next year, virus permitting, I want to fly onto a  glacier in Alaska and  those flights  go on planes equipped not with floats but with skis. Alaskan planes go skiing. 

Back on planet Earth where humans are meant to roam I started looking down at the rocks and shapes underfoot, temporarily exposed by low tides and a rapidly receding  dry season. 

I had anticipated the summer flooding season so I was wearing my Crocs, a consideration Rusty doesn't worry about. 

A snail or something similar had been for an underwater walk, spinning out a graffito because crawling off to dry land through the puddle:

A little sunshine, a little color and a reflection.

On our way back the non skull stump was still there sitting proud in the puddle. Rusty, panting heavily had to come back with me to reality and chores and deadlines and stuff.  

Impatience

My days off fall into a pattern, my evenings after work are fairly predictable, there is talk I may have to go back to night shift as we are falling desperately short of 911 dispatchers. I am happy enough working day shift but we don't always get what we want and my comfortable routines may be upset one more time before I get out the door.

Summer time means long evenings usually with some sunlight, less traffic and sweaty walks with my dog and my small camera. IN summer I tend to use my Lumix LX100ii which weighs half the amount of my big camera and feels like less of a burden when my shirt collar is sticking to the back of my neck.

There isn't much to see in the mangroves so I look for patterns and shapes and colors and shades while Rusty runs back and forth nose down. It's a companionable way to spend 40 minutes after our nightly YouTube exercise sweat on arrival at home, when my wife cooks and Rusty and I walk.

Webb Chiles has gone sailing in a large arc across the Atlantic and as he got his boat ready for a trip around Bermuda I felt a twinge of excitement anticipating my own departure next year. The year ahead promises lots of last minute appointments and decisions and the deeper we get into the year the further my mind floats from the daily routine.

Reading about the Yukon and Alaska I have realized one thing and that is I haven't a clue about animals I keep hearing about. Caribou reindeer elk and moose and what is the difference. Google knows and apparently they are all forms of deer. 

Difference.guru 

The main differences between the moose, elk, caribou, and reindeer would be in their body size, as well as the size and shape of their antlers. All four of these animals are species of deer but among the four, the moose is the largest. The elk, caribou and reindeer are almost the same size. When it comes to the antlers, the moose is the most different since its antlers are flat and wide. The caribou’s antlers can be easily identified since they are tall and curved. The antlers of the elk and reindeer are somewhat similar. However, the reindeer’s antlers are covered in velvet.

Among the four, the moose is the only solitary animal, while the elk, caribou and reindeer often travel in herds. The moose and elk are browsers or selective feeders. Reindeer, on the other hand, are grazers or roughage feeders. The caribou is noted to be an intermediate feeder or mixed forager.

The moose can be found in Canada and Alaska, while elk live in mountainous forests in North America and East Asia. Caribou are found in North America, Europe, Asia, and Greenland, whereas reindeer live primarily in the Arctic.

I like how the notion that one wants to travel brings out the nanny in people who don't like to travel. I have been reading a history of the Great Game and when I compare the places I want to wander to the fates of people who got mixed up in Empire building and that gives me a certain perspective. I think of Colonel Stoddart who was held by the Emir of Bokhara for four years variously under house arrest and in a  pit filled with rats and scorpions before he was beheaded in the square in front of Bokhara's Registan in 1842.  I shall spare him a thought if I get the van that far. I doubt in any event I shall be put in a  pit of beheaded but I suppose anything is possible.

Rusty has got used to the van and he hops in and out like he has been doing it all his life. He sits outside while we park and watches the world go by. When he and I are alone he rides on the passenger seat looking down on traffic as we go. He won't lay down on the bed by himself when we are underway but if my wife takes a nap he'll join her. I think he will do well on the road and I rely on him to let me know if a caribou or elk or something is in the vicinity. 

I face a  life of stress at work trying to make ends meet without enough employees but knowing there is an end in sight makes it bearable. At home my wife has a spreadsheet developing with chores to do and services to organize. She found a mail forwarding service based in Florida so we keep our state residence which is much prized for not having state income taxes. She has her eye on an airconditioned third floor storage place near the Miami airport which looks unlikely to flood and to be close by when we fly home. It's all in the details.

Colonoscopy? Tooth cleaning? Eyeglass prescription update? Order spare parts for the van? It all has to be done before we leave. It is an object lesson in how many complicated ways our lives are weaved.   

We had a fully vaccinated dinner at the house of a friend and his wife, a refugee from Venezuela (a wealthy one, not a manual laborer) looked frantic and sucked air through her teeth as she put down her piece of steak and shook her head violently when I spoke cheerfully of my ambitions to sit on the shores of Lake Titicaca, the highest navigable lake in the world. That notion went over like a fart in church and I got a long lecture about the communists in Bolivia and so forth as though I were planning to set myself up in business there.  The steak was good so I focused on that and let the hostess vent.

Her husband thought I was nuts and kept nudging my wife who speaks fluent Spanish and teaches English as a second language to avoid putting up with my lunacy. She of course wants to see Macchu Picchu in Peru and the wineries of Argentina and that provoked another fearsome round of warnings and head shaking. Dessert was a rather delicious cheese cake from Publix. I closed my eyes as well as my ears and focused on the creamy texture. 

Finally Manfred said he wanted to see the van so out we trooped and I was pretty certain there was another lecture in the works. Instead something very weird happened, and as I explained the van and it's systems he got a faraway look in his eyes. I think this might work he said. That's a good idea, he said and nodded in approval at the winch and the solar panels and all the stuff draped off the modest Promaster. 

He was a lot more thoughtful as we waved goodbye. He and his wife life in a palatial home on a  canal with all modern conveniences and great beauty and no way would she be seen dead on the road. And yet I can't help but think that there was a little seed planted there and in a  way I felt sad.

He spoke of slowing down and feeling less strong at seventy than he had a decade earlier. That sensation of life slipping away I suppose. I haven't felt it yet but knowing its coming pushes me harder in the direction of getting stuff done. I look forward to seeing them again, especially if he gets to ride along a bit, and the van allows him to bring out the boy as it does for me. For now I sit still and mark time and prepare to face all the daily irritations of getting stuff done. The payoff will come later.

Casa Marina

I remember overhearing, many years ago, one of those conversations between tourists speaking about their Key West vacation.

The comment I recall overhearing as they pored over their map was to the effect that they were surprised by how many districts and named areas there are in such a small island town.

They had a point, so much so I have never quite forgotten the remark and it comes to the forefront of my mind when I am walking through and thinking about Casa Marina.

Casa Marina's boundaries are not completely clear to me but like the justice said about the definition of pornography, I know it when I see it.

Expansive homes, garages, greenery and order all define Casa Marina.  By North American standards the houses may not necessarily be particularly large, and some look opulent thanks to the abundant tropical foliage alone, but in Key West ample parking, car ports and garages, watertight windows and an absence of stores and tourist attractions make this neighborhood as special.

It is common sport among the working class in Key West to look at real estate listings from "back home" wherever that may be, land of snowdrifts and seasons probably, and see how much your money will buy in those places forgotten in the mists of time. 

It's a mug's game to compare housing here with there. In absolute terms Key West is not as expensive as other exclusive enclaves in Florida but the isolation, the absence of regular housing and the relatively hopeless wages deter the ambitious from living working and raising a family here.

Casa Marina is not for the likes of us, and considering my home will be 72 square feet next year you might reassure yourself I never was a candidate for opulent living.  

I see obligation and responsibility when I walk the neighborhood and I am glad there are others dedicated to the maintenance and care of these historic homes. I grew up in an old large home and was glad to put an ocean between me and it, and would do so again for the freedom of the open road.

I was following Rusty down one of the ample, shaded sidewalks  when I was waylaid by a  tall sinewy Nordic blond woman who blurted at me that she was from Idaho. Oh dear I said, I'm sorry to hear that but I suppose someone has to live there. 

It turns out she was jogging as you do in Idaho apparently, in skin tight clothes which do not allow for the transport of cellphones and when her problem manifested itself on her run, she found herself helpless. Especially as she didn't know who to call. Until the off duty dispatcher showed up dragged by his dog.

A bird had fallen from a nest and she had propped it up on some gravel and was unsure what to do next. Oh well, I blurted before I put the filter in, I do this for a living so I might as well do it on my day off for free. She was shockingly grateful and made me wish she could teach people how to call 911...but I got the wild bird rescue rolling  and used Rusty as my excuse to leave her to monitor the avian rescue program on her own.

With the natural order restored and the time space continuum once again intact Casa Marina slipped back into serenity and ease. Hmm I thought to myself, seeing the Sprinter across the street, they live in vans around here? Probably not a stranger I figured, as someone would be bound to call it in...

Most people know Casa Marina as the resort on the beach in this neighborhood and it's been around for a while. Henry Flagler had it built as a destination for his travelers, those who chose not to take the ferry to Cuba in the 1920s. 

Flagler was pretty smart and when he decided to run railroad tracks up and down the east coast of Florida he figured he'd better give people a reason to visit so he built resorts in St Augustine, Palm Beach and Key West.

The Keys extension never made money but it got a bunch of New Yorkers to Cuba and the Keys for winter and it supplied tropical fruit in good order to people in the northeast for which they must have been grateful.

Not all Casa Marina is vast single family dwellings, as witnessed by this apartment building:

You could see a pretty little cottage like this in many areas of Florida, not just here:

And I have been photographing this magnificent wall of symmetrical shapes for years and I still don't feel like I've cracked it. I'd probably get stopped for loitering before I figure out the most interesting angle but I'm still trying:

One day before I leave I am going to rent a golf cart and ride around with a big grin and a long line of cars forced to follow me. I've never driven one and I think its time to add the experience to my long list of vehicles driven.

A house with a pool...dream on little Rusty. 

And while I was pondering life and reflections he stepped smartly out of the frame as usual leaving me in the mirror alone.