Dark Streets

I managed somehow to get to work early one recent morning and stopped on the way to take a few pictures of the serenity of the night. College Road is annexed to the city of Key West which uses it to house useful buildings including a school, a marina, a college, the SPCA, the bus facility, a hospital, a  rehab facility of no great repute (hence my own rehab in Miami) as well as the Jail and Sheriff's headquarters and a golf course with the original reason for the annexation: a housing development at the private golf course. None of that massive amount of useful activity shows at 5:20 in the morning. Nor, I dare say, should it.

I usually get up at 4:30 and take Rusty to "check the mail," a brief neighborhood walk to see what other dogs have been out and about in the twenty four hours preceding. I try to leave the house by 5:15 and generally fail spectacularly rushing down the stairs at I hope some time before 5:25, the absolute last minute not to look like a pill and arrive at work at exactly 6 am. The overnight shift as I know from long experience does not look cheerfully upon their morning relief if they show up technically on time but with none to spare.

It was a windy morning and I tried to catch the essence of the invisible air overhead. I'm not sure if it just looks smeared but anyway there was a fair bit of movement. It has been delightfully windy spring with lots of cool, not to say cold air blowing away insects and humidity. 

Moving on I took Flagler Avenue instead of the faster North Roosevelt as I wanted to save stopping and photographing the Boulevard another day. I had so much time in hand I could afford to hang around here and try to capture the night and the sense of emptiness in the middle of new Town.

These days looking at the roads I drive daily and have driven for two decades has an almost banal air to it, like those pictures one sees of daily life lived, except they are from a different era entirely. I have all too few pictures of my sixty years of daily banal living up to this point so in anticipation of things changing I have been trying to make a conscious effort to photograph the memories of daily life. Before the virus I was trying to capture the essence of my commute in pictures, trying to find a way to express the crowds, the traffic lights, the hold ups and the open roads without slipping into the obvious. It was much harder than I expected. These days these few pictures pretty much sum up my drive in to work. It is bizarre. 

Even at six o'clock in the evening when most people have gone home, the few that still have regular desk jobs, the road out of towns wide open. Even with the road work proceeding relentlessly slowly at the Triangle, the Cow Key Bridge as it is properly known, reflow quite smoothly through the winding traffic cones. How odd it is to find small pockets of advantage in the presence of this virus lock down. Empty streets that feel destined never to be filled again.

Color And Sun

I am working this weekend, Saturday Sunday and Monday. six in the morning till six at night therefore the sun is scheduled to shine. By Tuesday when I get a day off rain is forecast. Naturally.

Check out these colors under the sun from last week. I have always thought of the Keys as green white and blue but red yellow and blue has been seen quite a bit around town. Must be the lack of people or something.

A few petals on the windshield of a black car...lots of negative space!

I saw this octopus and fish and I marveled at the homeowner who can imagine these kinds of decorations. I liked it a lot.

The southwestern pot sitting in a. porch with the rising sun. Rusty and I were walking sometime after seven in the morning and as he stops to sniff I see this ray of sunshine on this classic design that I think of as typical New Mexico. Irresistible.

Check out this chunk of coral rock.  You can't pick this stuff up if you are in a park but if you have some more power to you. The textures are amazing to look at. Imagine an aerial view of a desert or a glacier and you could hold the rock in your hand.

The next two pictures got not much traction on Instagram but I love the history. This is what I see during lock down, no people, no signs of human eccentricity, and instead the quiet signs stand out. History is everywhere.

There is so much history of technology in human progress. Chewing gum, yellow fever, tooth extractions...you name it things have got better ostensibly. A lot of people think we will see a new normal after the pandemic but I doubt it. I suspect we will go back to commuting polluting, getting and and being "normal" in a hurry.   Mindfulness is a pain in the fast paced world. I can't wait to retire!

The factory sent me a message to say the van conversion should be finished the first week of June. We shall see but I look forward to picking up my quarantine machine.  My new normal! Just in time for hurricane season, as planned.

Rain And A Van

I woke up late yesterday and Rusty was a long way from bothering me for a walk. Even I the human could hear the wind and the rain lashing the house. I kept the hurricane shutters up after Hurricane Irma to keep the bedroom dark when I worked nights and the rain hitting the metal sounds very cosy, like sleeping in a. tent. On the other hand yesterday was a day off so I would have preferred the usual sunshine and mosquitoes. Beggars can't be choosers.

Oh, the van. Well that happened like this. After I struggled out of bed, kicked the dog awake and mooched out to the deck I had a look at the world through my Internet connection which is very inexpensive and not always brilliantly effective. However I did find a Custom Coach Creations post on Facebook pointing out that work continues. I was more than a little surprised to see my own creation appear, not finished but definitely in progress. I am pretty sure it's my van thanks to the color, a $100 option from Promaster that requires a four month wait for delivery so Bob told me this is only the second gold colored van he has converted.  I wanted maroon but my wife slapped me and said that was too bright and we compromised on gold. They also offered to order the external accessories in black so when I saw the running board and roof Maxfan in black I was pretty certain this is Gannet 2 being assembled. The narrow rear window over the raised bench seats is also what we ordered.

The funny part is we were supposed to get a video of the roughed out interior last week but so far we have had no word from the factory which lack of news set my neurons jangling. Patience, she counseled so here we are, spotting the soothing beast through the foliage of Facebook.  This is progress I thought as I made tea and girded my loins for a visit to the doctor for a semi annual check up. turns out I am alive and blood pressure is normal and my legs s till work,  $25 co-pay and back into the rain. Jolly good. And the van is coming along...

Dr Grider in Big Pine is what I like to think of as a thoroughly modern but old fashioned practical sort of family practice doctor.  He's up to speed with the latest medical news but he operates thoughtfully with good practical common sense. It would not be difficult to imagine him in Mayberry making house calls with a black bag and a cheerful smile. Of course this is 2020 and I drove to his office where we went through a coronavirus caper to get into the office.

I parked the car and called the office. A figure appeared through the murk ready to escort me to the verandah because apparently most patients forget to bring an umbrella when it's raining. How that is possible I couldn't say as the rain was coming down in apocalyptic bucketsful and was thus hard to ignore.  At the top of the stairs I sanitized my hands and they took my temperature and escorted me into a waiting room rather in the manner of more furtive and possibly illegal transactions. Life in the time of plague has become like that. Whereas once entering a bank wearing a simple hat was illegal and suspicious, nowadays not being masked is the mark of the irresponsible and undesirable customer. 

After my good health was assured I hauled myself to the gas station to refuel my wife's Fiat 500 which she, working from home, isn't driving and I use it when not transporting the hound from hell. It really does get excellent mileage. Too bad they aren't selling them anymore, as our convertible is a keeper.

There is something especially dreary about the Keys in a prolonged rain storm. Once the pleasure of the variation in weather has worn off the heavy downpour  curtails outdoor activity and steals away one of the great joys of living in the tropics. However the pandemic restrictions have modified some of my feelings about rainy weather. Rusty and I aren't walking but he is not fond of the rain and he is smart enough to appreciate the roof over his formerly stray head. He curls up on the couch in this kind of weather and waits for better days.

Matinee movies are off, museums are closed, music is nowhere to be heard, so alternatives to rain are limited as usual  by the damned virus and so we revert to the home.  My great hope about the interior of the van which we will have to test is that it will be a pleasant enough space to live in when we have to deal with unpleasant weather. Small it will be, but I hope it will be comfortable enough not to have us going nuts inside as the weather outside batters the tin shell. We shall see.

I didn't bother to bring Rusty on this trip as there was no point. It felt odd, slightly unnatural not have my partner on the back seat. I stopped to take some pictures and pictured him at home curled up sleeping. He had the right idea on a day like thus. Niles Channel Bridge:

Traffic is light these days except for a few more vehicles than you might expect during rush hour which by any urban standard is hardly measurable as commuter traffic. In the rain it felt like there was even less than normal which gives the community a feeling of emptiness even more pronounced than usual.

I saw a lot of discussion online about the fifty odd people who gathered in Key West a few days ago to demand the Sheriff take down the roadblocks on US 1 and Card Sound Road. I don't know how you measure accurately the numbers for and against keeping non residents out but it seems to me from a distance that the people who want the county opened up are much louder than the majority who want to keep things as. they are. The absolutely appalling thing about the protest was that it was engineered and paid for by a local hotel and souvenir shop owner who was seen handing out signs and money to the rent-a-mob.

I have my own problems with the coronavirus shut down as I see the point of people who want to work and take their chances as opposed to entering the twilight zone of no money no prospects and no hope of a new Great Depression. As one who has a job and whose wife works I don't feel it is my place to argue for or against the shut down as we aren't being directly impacted and my wife with her immune system problems is very grateful to stay at home and remain isolated.

 It seems to me that if there is going to be a legal requirement not toward and to stay home the people and institutions ordering the shut down should take financial responsibility for it. It just doesn't seem fair to deprive people of their livings and to tell them to take their chances. European states offer free comprehensive health care, stipends, the freezing of bills including rent and mortgages and spends money like water to compensate. Here in the US on the one hand we reject socialism in any form whatsoever, even ones that don't really exist and yet we deprive people of the chance to make a living. And fund major corporations as usual with public money and then scream poverty. It is as incoherent as the medical advice we do and don't get.

I confess I am confused. I don't feel like laying blame or getting mad or ranting on Facebook. I stay home, hug my dog, support my wife, go to work and stay six feet from anyone. At the grocery store I wear my mask, at work I use disinfectant and sanitizer and try to measure people who call 911 that we are. there to help. And no, I have no idea when the roads will reopen. Not this month at any rate.

The county has said hotels can start to take reservations for future dates but there is the proviso they may be canceled (and refunded) if the closure of the county continues. For now the Keys are closed to outsiders. And our numbers are officially very low, not that I expect them to be terribly accurate. However there are about a dozen people in hospitals I think, around a hundred confirmed cases and three deaths the last time I checked the newspaper. On a population of 75,000 we are cooking with gas and no one doubts keeping the doors closed is keeping the contagion away. Lucky us.

In my estimation the true hero of this respite we have from the coronavirus is the Sheriff. Singlehanded Rick Ramsey is the only countywide leader who has been seen everywhere lending a hand lots of encouragement and keeping the virus out of the county with his roadblocks. The sheriff told the state he was keeping the roads closed when they told him to re-open them. He has helped organize food distribution and clean ups and everywhere he goes he has his mask, his crisp pressed uniform and words of encouragement. 

So we keep on keeping on and hope for the best.  Hoping for the best, staying strong, being safe, all those bromides are flying around the ether but I wonder how prepared we are to face the economic consequences of this virus that is killing us, trapping us, and giving us a chance to see what it feels like to lose all sense of normal, and certainty and the ability to make plans and look into the future with confidence. If we lose our minds and our sense of humor and sense of neighborliness through all this daily hassle the virus wins. 

School is in session and Rusty is learning by osmosis. I think. I'm going to take a nap as the rain hasn't stopped.

Key West 1968

I find myself wandering YouTube from time to time and my searches lead me astray, odd that, into places I don't expect. A drive to Key West in 1968 was one that caught my eye amidst all the tourist dreck and platitudes you will find about the Southernmost City. Key West And Environs 1968

Two things struck me about the video. One was that there were no free range chickens in 1968. I saw none in the pictures and I don't doubt had there been they would have been featured for a brief second as part of the lightning tour of Key West included in the video. The second was the number of nostalgic comments the video evoked. That surprised me considering how there was nothing in the video you could not do these days, pandemics excepted.

For a vacationer the drive on Highway One, the required stop at the Southernmost Point, in those days a billboard, and a Conch Tour train ride are all easily within grasp today. You can even buy Conch shells which, as endangered as they are, have to be imported from distant lands where Conch are either more abundant or valued as a weird source of foreign currency. Below I photographed the workshop at Key West Electrical on Margaret Street which is as close to the tourist epicenter as you might imagine and yet is as practical and hands on as anyone might desire who has had a broken boat starter motor (me). 

What has changed is the number of people, the increased restrictions on a life grown exponentially more expensive. I read a rant on Facebook, home of the unhappy loud voiced consumer in modern society, and discovered the military have been detaining people who ventured onto property the military has claimed for itself  at the end of the popular beach next to the military base. I photographed the beach last January and already I was told the new signs had been up for several weeks. US Property. 

Apparently people found wandering the beach were cited by the military who had decided arbitrarily to close what had always been open. I question their ownership of and that once was a public road eaten away by successive storms, especially as they have a boundary fence in a severe state of disrepair paralleling the water but I have no doubt some new draconian state of affairs has required the curtailing of one more open space for use by people wedged into these islands.

That's the world the video hints at without being able to show it clearly. In 1968 the old US Highway ran right through the Boca Chica Navy Base and it still does, it's the truck entrance on Rockland Key, but these days it's inconceivable that civilians should drive casually through like that. Except actually it isn't. KeyWest bases had two instances of Chinese persons, I mean Communist Chinese citizens driving onto Navy bases in key West and eventually being arrested. The judge hearing thecae was scandalized by the lack of security and I suspect that momentary lapse has promoted tightening of Boca Chica where people go to sunbathe not spy. Most people that is. I go there to walk the dog and photograph the sunrise in a place where no one else does.

Nostalgia will nag at me when I leave Key West, it already is. Part of me fears the restrictions of the coronavirus world we live in will be extended indefinitely, part of me wonders how did I get so lucky to be allowed to live out this topsy turvey time in this wonderful place.  I got a blast of nostalgia when I saw the advertising on a Fiat 500, none of which are now imported to the US, this one bearing the spots "upgrade" that was desirable and expensive in my youth. Abarth meant you were a speed freak. I am not quite sure what you do with a manual sorts gearbox in a. stick shift car in the straight roads across the plains of Florida but nostalgia knows no common sense. It was nice to see.

I met a former colleague now retired who runs a small business in Key West. He is limping along on line his wife works from home and he has taken to the Conch style of holding court with friends and ruminating on the state of the world. Neither of us is in fear of imminent financial hardship, the city has a solid retirement plan, but we both pondered the meaning of a pandemic that has shut down all economic activity driving more people out of work than the Great Depression managed in the 1930s.

There are no answers to any of it and I suggested we will know more in twelve months, maybe. Meanwhile I take Rusty's example and try to enjoy the good bits, not dwell on the bad and keep my fingers crossed. A dog in the driveway is better than a stray abandoned in a field. 

Duval Street Pandemic

The Valdez flag of the Conch Republic ("a state of mind") hits me in the eye these days more often than usual.

There are signs along Duval Street advising street paving will close the blocks between Front Street and Truman Avenue as the city takes advantage of the quiet to undertake disruptive street projects.

Disruption seems to be the order of the day anyway with businesses closing and not planning to reopen. Frequently the strategy seems to be to not declare a fixed plan. IC Doubles closed months ago, a brief visit by a new bar where the Lazy Gecko used to be a fixture. Now there is a sandal shop advertising. How a sandal discount store can afford Duval Street rents might be a mystery to anyone who thinks business is always operated to make a profit. 

A whole string of these little shop windows, $30,000 a month each maybe, are closed and empty. One business on a  side street, Kojin noodle shop on Southard Street complained loudly on Facebook that their lease expired in October and they can't work out a deal with their landlord. Greed is always the cry though it seems to me capitalists live by the sword when times are good and therefore die by the sword when they suck. Bailouts seem to be preferred though when the going gets rough. 

I remember in the boom years before 2008 when Key West was bulging with money as people mortgaged their homes for one more vacation or showy luxury purchases and my friends in Key West moaned all the time how money was wrecking the town. Which may have been true but I remember a lot more trickle down in those days when working as a bar back earned more money than a 911 dispatcher. I was in it for the long haul and looking for a pension, so aside from the fact I dislike bars I knew where I wanted to plod along and earn a living. After the 2008 crash I had no doubts about the merits of full time year round union work in Key West. Much like today.

I have no doubt tourists will be back when the roads are re-opened as key West's vacation appeal has not dimmed, nor can it considering it is the easiest safest tropical destination in the country. However i hate seeing people's dreams of a small business in Key West shattered. These are the businesses that can't shout loud enough to be heard when corporations are holding their hands out for some capitalist support.

Walking past the oldest house in South Florida I found myself pondering how many yellow fever epidemics it had seen, as witnessed by all the tombs in the cemetery of young people struck down by an invisible misunderstood deadly illness. Yellow fever was not established as a mosquito borne disease until the Panama Canal was built in the early 1900s. The death toll at the eighth wonder of the world was such the US military had to figure out what was yellow fever and how did it kill. Key West had been living with sudden deadly infections since the city was founded in 1828, 90 years of random deadly epidemics. You could do a lot worse than study the work of William Gorgas at a time like this, a man of science who saved lives and is largely forgotten.

The old time businesses on Duval will undoubtedly pull through. They have a customer base and decades of making healthy profits means they are stable enough to either own their buildings or have reserves to re-ignite the reputations after the latest infection washes away. The cleaning and refurbishing of The Bull was a welcome sight, anticipating a better future.

Lots of activity, like a school before term begins.Watched over by a very interested pigeon.

And as if the work on Duval Street weren't enough there was also major pipe laying construction on neighboring Simonton Street.

That's the measure of how empty the city is, two major parallel streets closed simultaneously and no traffic back up to be seen on a Monday morning.

Rainy Days

We have received word that Up North there is snow and a sudden unwarranted return to winter. The upshot down here is a sudden return...to winter.  Yesterday the doors were thrown open and Rusty sat disconsolately on the deck watching the water drip off the eaves. For a confirmed air conditioning freak the idea of open doors at home mid May is bizarre but the east wind was cool and the skies were overcast.

I took these pictures a few days ago and I am posting them here because I am too old to go out under an umbrella and look for wild scenes. Rusty got his evening walk between downpours and the evening ended up with milk and cookies in front of the TV. 

The Citizen newspaper ran an article reporting stormy weather on the economic front with a partial list of businesses that have decided not to come back after the shut down of the Keys. Coffee Plantation, Kojin, Fresh Produce were some of the names. More will follow no doubt in a town where prices are so high and anyone can collapse in the face of absolutely no business happening.

I have given up trying to follow or understand the virus because I feel like it has a laser focus on population centers up north. A rash of infection has appeared in a local retirement home which is part of the pattern and one can legitimately wonder what happens next. On the other hand no one seems to know anything about coronavirus or what to expect. 

I am having. hard time wrapping my head around the prospect of another Great Depression. Anyone who lived through the last one was marked for life by the experience. If we face general economic collapse God help people already living in the edge, be they here or in the Third World. I have heard the statistic that most Americans have no defense in the face of an unexpected bill and it breaks my heart seeing so many food giveaways. The millionaire class is nowhere to be seen and they are the ones who want their name on every pubic work they want to fund. Restaurants and employed workers feed the hungry in this town, led by the amazing Catholic Charities operation.

The rain falls on the just and unjust alike, just the same way the sun shines and we will all feel the pain of this badly managed catastrophe.  We in the keys are exempt from a lot of the indecisive leadership thanks to the decisiveness of the Sheriff who shut down the roads and kept out a long line of cars filled with people who don't get social distancing. I'd like to think self discipline and survival would drive people to take care of their community but it doesn't seem to work like that.

People in Europe have been locked down like they are in prison unlike here in Florida where outdoor activities done alone or with family members have been tolerated. Like the man said we live in a time when being anti social isn't just tolerated, it's required. Lovely.

Except being confined to quarters is not lovely at all. When you live in the tropics you expect rain in the seasons. nice time to watch the temperature drop under dramatic cloudy skies. But after a short while one expects to see blue skies and bright colors again. I spent yesterday darting in and out doing some over due gardening chores watched by a dog who remembers all too well living in the wild and getting wet. Rusty appreciates living out of the weather.

The Citizen news paper's wordy editor who is relatively new around here took a long column to explain that we will be served better by a smaller paper which will now publish three days a week, down from six. Its a time of intense news coverage and political oneupmanship tat we really don't need yet the coverage will shrink. It's like when you go to the supermarket and they preface their innovations with "...to serve you better..." which is never true.

This is a time of uncertainty and thus we get aphorisms bromides and platitudes aplenty. Our indebted  neighbors call for freedom in the face of the virus, our leaders look confused and we are advised to stay safe and stay strong. Well, ok, I'll try. I'll stand on the sidelines scratch my head and continue making my deliveries of dog food which I surreptitiously add to my grocery runs and drop off at the SPCA which says there are people who can't feed their pets. Now that gives me the creeps as I look at Rusty fun walked and loved snoring in his bed.

The rain will go away and I hope the virus follows suit and quickly. Please.