Dinner With Friends, The Internet And Aspergers

I am not a sociable type. To me solitary confinement, with books and movies will be heaven. I have previously mentioned I have autism Key West Diary: My Life With Aspergers Syndrome which makes it very difficult for me to cope with people. Yet from time to time my wife drags me out in public. To be dragged onto Carol's deck of a warm December evening is not a terrible hardship as you can see.

Carol loves plants the way I love solitude and when I made a noise about how much I envied her botanical garden I got put in my lazy ass place. "You have to do the work," Cathy remarked rather acidly. It was probably a comment tossed out without much thought, but like a snail I pulled my antennae in and nursed my Magic Hat while sitting among the fronds and wondering how lucky my dog was to be at home alone.

The reason for the gathering was a dude in glasses who showed up in Key West to make Cathy happy. I have to say I admire Terry's fortitude for showing up for the first time ever in a Key West simply because he had fallen in love with his high school friend. After decades apart they reconnected finding themselves both unattached and Cathy's friends decided to put the heat on The Man From Niagara Falls.

I tried to talk to Terry and imagine my difficulty when it turned out Cathy's boyfriend loves sports. My heart sank, as among my many man deficits is the fundamental shortcoming that sports strike me as God's own waste of time. I cast around trying to see if the aquarium had any escape hatches. My wife smiled at me sweetly indicating thusly that I was here for the duration. Well I said, in my own throwaway line that apparently left a profound mark of gratitude on the Man From Niagara Falls, it's got to be intimidating facing all these strangers. Cathy, in black, and Katherine, with LulaMae, who is as delightful with people as she is vicious with other dogs, hence Cheyenne's banishment at home.

I tried to contribute to the conversation, which mostly talked of people and times past, not inclusive for a pale skinned stranger from Up North as they were introspective memories for long time residents of Key Weird. I tried to add my own reflections on the life of a colleague adapting to her new life in a new town as a way to explain the difficulties of, and time needed for, assimilation. I have been taught a few techniques by well meaning friends and professionals to teach me to cut myself off before I become boring or doctrinaire, a common failing of socially inept smart people with Aspergers, and ended my feeble attempt to assimilate the New Guy. I also tripped up when talk turned to Pittsburgh, Carol's place of origin, which was deemed badly named as it too accurately described it as being a pit, they said. My Aspergers got me again and I blurted its origin as named for the Earl of Chatham, Pitt the Elder, whose son the Younger...as interesting as the youngest British Prime Minister is to me and how he created taxes to fund the Napoleonic Wars might be, I quickly realized the conversational green traffic light had turned to red and I shut up. My over taxed brain was worn out and it was barely dark.

Something happened as we discussed where to go for dinner. I don't recall how it happened but after a stretch of silence as I watched clouds dart overhead and I desperately wanted to try to photograph a palm in night time silhouette, and people were giving very negative reviews of a new southern cuisine restaurant in town I blurted my joy at a recent encounter with a Twinkie. Key West Diary: The World's Most Expensive Twinkie. I went a bit overboard describing my joy at the layers of soft milk chocolate melting in your mouth, followed by the soft sponge and the smooth flavor-free Twinkie cream in the middle. I drooled. "Do you enjoy sex quite that much?" Catherine asked archly, raising her delicate black eyebrow in a mixture of curiosity and amusement.

We went to the Key Plaza Crêperie, a place previously enjoyed by my wife and I and which required no "long drive" all the way across Key West as Carol lives in New Town.

I ordered pappardelle alla carbonara and framed Catherine on the left and Lucy on the right as we waited for more wine and galettes, as they call buckwheat crêpes here.

Cathy got the much praised berry salad galette with a carrot flower carved as a garnish. Dinner conversation flowed about us and I drifted off, trying to eat slowly, never easy for me as I tend to focus on one task at a time and demolish each job as quickly and efficiently as I can. Eating is just one more such task, in my autistic world.

By the time we got to dessert the wine had flowed a bit and the conversation too. Catherine thought my Napoleon cake, a rather more immense brick than I had previously envisioned, merited a photograph. I love flakey pastry and custard, but there was rather more here than I could reasonably manage so, because sharing is caring I am told, I passed chunks around, not before she caught a frame of me cowering behind my immense slab of pudding.

Lucy told us about her own art exhibit at the Salt Gallery at Margaret and Fleming (note to self...) and gave us information about the inflatable art exhibit underway at Truman Waterfront while her husband Jan lost himself in slices of my cake. Jan had caught me earlier getting lost in the bubbles rising through a liquid display on the walls which I had noticed before, Key West Diary: Key Plaza Creperie, but which this time helped me zone out as a reprieve from conversing. I watched the bubbles in fascination as they rose through the pale blue water, swirling and twirling possibly at random in distinct and different streams. It felt very calming to watch them, until Jan busted me! Look away he said, admitting to the same fascination.

Terry wanted to record his night of adult debauchery, his last before flying home the next day, Cathy but a wisp of scent in his memory cells, so we did the obedient thing and lined up. Let me say here my pictures of people may look a bit skew-whiff, that being so their inappropriate expressions are due solely to my shortcomings as a photographer and are not representative of the mood of the gathering which was quite cheerful.

Carol, Cathy Steve (the Internet fact checker) and Catherine, all of whom appear embarrassingly dissipated, but were simply relaxing for a moment between gales of laughter. Catherine was looking at desserts and pondered a coffee selection. Affogata? she queried the table at large...My wife spoke up pointing out I speak Italian. Drowned I said, usually ice cream in coffee.

He's right Catherine confirmed, it means drowned, after glancing at Steve's phone. In a certain light on Carol's chiaroscuro flowery deck he looked just like Somerset Maugham, a bit unnerving since the famously crusty British writer of ambiguous sexuality has been dead for quite a while. But he did confirm my abstruse knowledge of obscure place names and bizarre foreign drinks. I wished I felt like Chris the waiter who knew exactly what to do when asked for a photo pose. No inhibitions that young man. He represented Key West nicely to The Man From Niagara Falls whose idea of life on the edge of reality was getting a work out.

Lucy and Jan, full of my Napoleon, relaxed on their own end of the table while the accountants in the party tried to figure out the bill. I think it was around $260 for nine people and my hasty suggestion we divide it by ten and double the result for couples was met with howls of indignation as being simplistic - the teetotalers insisted on that point to we the wine drinkers. But there are only nine of us! That was the joke I replied and the arithmetically impaired calmed down. Chris' joke that he wanted to get home before midnight started to look like a distinct possibility as the complexity of bill sharing defeated the sharpest minds at the table.

Steve and Catherine keeping an eye on Google information as they waited for the bill to get sorted. Not being from a large family a bill that size in and of itself was quite a shock to someone like me but I did the usual and left it to my capable wife to sort out the dollar signs. While I was sitting there dreaming of my bed I was tapped on my shoulder and introduced to Massimo, the chef-owner brought to my side by my wife who knows how much I love speaking Italian on demand with strangers in front of an audience. He is from Palermo and is glad to be out of Sicily where the economy is on its knees. "So what did you talk about?" Cathy wanted to know. This and that. As one does, among immigrants from il bel paese.

My lunch break Monday was a Badboy burrito on my favorite bench at the sports field at the end of Petronia Street. Me, alone with my Kindle and a deep blue sky overhead through the branches of a shady gumbo limbo.

No need after that to worry about what I said to whom and who I may have offended in a social setting. Aspergers is exhausting, in English and Italian.

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Changing Signs

I am 56 years old and I fear sometimes that I have lived too long already, that the Biblical span of three score years and ten will see me utterly worn out. I don't mean physically so much as mentally worn out. I have grown old in a world where we are assured that change comes faster and faster as electro I'd chips get smaller and more capable of transforming impulses int actions. I'm not yet ready for instance to take my portable telephone for granted. Every time I use it for something that a telephone was never intended to do, I marvel. Then I wonder if in fact this trajectory of GPS, mapping, locator devices, web based information hasn't been planned for longer than we think. People come on vacation to regress in time, they ride bicycles, they talk to each other, they lie under the sun. Key West gives them a brief respite if they want it, from daily electronic labor saving drudgery. Rent a bike, we've got plenty!

I feel stuck in my era in some respects. For instance I find front seat restraints in a car to be as natural as breathing. Yet I recall growing up in a world without seat belts and I was the first in my village to get optional seat belts in the first new car I bought (a 1979 Driving Impression: Fiat X1/9 in case you are interested) and they were the subject of much debate, not that they worked very well at that time. Nowadays I wonder when I see people put seat belts on in the back seat of a car. In Europe where regulation is strict they are becoming required and thats just too modern for my reptilian sensibilities. I have heard it said the electronic books will destroy libraries and I tremble. I am addicted to the Kindle applications on my iPad and my phone and I have found electronic editions of books I could never find in paper since I lost sight of them thirty years ago. Yet I love stopping by the library for books videos or browsing. That the oldest public library in Florida may be supplanted by Kindle horrifies me.

A library is a repository of community roots. There is a large ad growing collection of documents and pictures relating Key West's history for instance. This sign still sits on the wall of the library, asking people not to feed disease spreading chickens and that from a time when public chickens weren't a tourist attraction but a nuisance. So do you believe the stories of the beloved wandering chickens or do you eleven the historic sign on the wall?

I am child-free so a lot of the stuff that happens because of children escapes my notice or my understanding. School buses I know, I used to drive one years ago in California, mostly because I lived in a big school district and they needed lots of drivers, getting the special license was a challenge and I figured one day I could move to the transit district a unionized job with more hours higher pay and similar benefits. That never happened but I think back to the Pajaro Valley Unified School District with fondness when I am stopped for a Monroe County School bus. I can honestly say however that I do not recall cyclists stopping for my bus. Perhaps they did and I didn't notice. They certainly do here.

The recycling failures of this city continue to bug me. Nuff Sed.

Scooters in Key West that are used for deliveries, and a lot are, normally carry the food in ice chests bolted to the luggage rack like this one. I steer clear of these scooters when they are in action as the riders frequently like to prove their localness by talking on the phone while delivering or otherwise not paying attention while cutting corners for tips. In case you are wondering I have discovered ice chests make poor luggage carriers as they aren't properly waterproof and because they are insulated they tend to be hugely bulky on the outside considering the space available inside. And their lids have a tendency to fly open at speed. But I have never delivered good using one.

I liked the reflection in the window and as I looked at the picture I was struck by a doctor requiring appointments until I remembered she's a shrink. Still the reflection looked nice.

The sun still low in the sky became an actual sunburst through the truck windshield which was creating the effect as it was covered in dew, or last nights drizzle or something. Cheyenne just wanted me to keep moving.

I love gold pasta for breakfast. So does Cheyenne apparently.

Appitizers? I had to find out from a friend what might be a fireball or a Dr McGillicudy. A fireball is a cinnamon flavored whiskey and Shanmon says it makes her forgetful. The other stuff is flavored Schnapps which sounds lethal to me. Headache country I suspect.

And in closing I spotted this Italian Aprilia scooter..I can't put my finger on why but it looked distinctive and attractive to me. It's just two wheels and a lot of bodywork like any other scooter but it has some not clearly defined sparkle.

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Another day another few Key West pictures.

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Historic Seaport, Key West Bight

There is a particular shade of blue that colors the early morning sky over Key West and I like walking under it. Here is the Galleon a Resort overlooking the marinas of Key West Bight.

A "bight" in nautical language is an indentation in the coastline suitable to use as an anchorage. Or as landlubbers might say in this case, suitable to line with a boardwalk and restaurants. Alonzo's, where locals eat happy hour seafood appetizers and drink rum. Highly recommended.

You can find mind numbing serenity here early in the day before the sun heats the air and causes it to rise creating water ruffling breezes. The water is like a mirror, just as I like it. No crashing waves tumbling on sandy beaches or breaking in a fountain of spume on rocky headlands.

It seems futile to add words to these banal colorful pictures. It was dawn, what else needs to be added?

Down on the docks life is jumbled, crowded and chaotic, defying the serenity of the surrounding waters.

"PRIVATE." Happily the boardwalk isn't and I recommend a dawn walk around here the next time you are in town.

One day at four o'clock I will recall this sign and I will get my phone camera over here. Not so far.

Fifty cent oysters and outdoor seating. A perfect fall evening in Key West.

Cheyenne needed a time out after a long downtown walk. She took it in front of the fancy Commodore, a restaurant whose hearth I have never darkened. My wife cooks a very edible steak for much less money. Plus I don't have to dress up at home.

More dawn nonsense. I am a sentimental sucker for color and simple compositions!

The roofline of the Conch Republic Seafood (not an eatery I would choose) more closely resembles a pagoda at certain angles...

This dawn and all it's colors just won't end will it?

Miraculously there are still a few commercial fishing boats that put in an appearance in the bight, the place that used yo be packed with them. They have decamped to Stock Island today to make room for wealthy amateurs and their plastic gin palaces.

This young lad identifies himself as a commercial fisherman by the style of the footwear he is carrying. His t-shirt is emblazoned with the initials of the Fish and Wildlife Commission, the former Marine Patrol. The white rubber boots are known locally as "Stock Island Nikes" so popular are they among the commercial fishermen now based in the harbors of Stock Island.

I am not alone in enjoying an early morning stroll along the waterfront:

Getting ready for a fishing charter:

Shipshape and Bristol fashion, is the way sailors used to describe having everything in order, including these neat coils of dock lines. I never kept mine like this as they seemed to retain water and encouraged moldy green stuff to grow underneath the line.

I think the city has done a nice job of making the bight accessible and pleasant for visitors.

Norberg Thompson was the man who got the plan going, and here he is with a monument to his name. Apparently he led a now defunct industrial enterprise including fishing in Key West and enjoyed recreational boating himself so I guess he had a stake in developing this waterfront! He was 65 in 1951 when he was killed by a cerebral hemorrhage.

The Key West waterfront is a gathering place for all sorts of characters, just as waterfronts always have been places of disrepute. Though you can't say that about the Key West Bight.

Well, she is a bit disreputable after a walk and several puddle baths.

The former waterfront market behind Cheyenne in the picture is undergoing construction to be turned into the new beer venue much discussed over the summer in a Key West.

Okay, I have a question. Why do people especially those of the male persuasion like to ride scooters while dangling their feet off their floorboards? I don't see any advantage except the possibility of breaking every bone in one's foot if the delicate limb hits the ground at speed or at an angle. The disadvantage is immediately apparent: you ride with your weight on your...gentleman vegetables, which I find painful. So why in the name of all that's sensible don't they put their feet on the floorboards intended for the purpose? Do they enjoy squashing their testicles? Really?

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