Sounds Like Key West

Have you ever experienced such a strong connection to a place that you could feel it in your bones? Sometimes it comes from a sense of familiarity and belonging. Like my mother before me, I have always felt separated at birth from the Gulf Coast—I love Mississippi, she loves Alabama, and we're both sold on the Florida Panhandle. I am never more serene and content than when I'm walking along the water's edge—correction, THAT water's edge—watching the seagulls dive for fish and breathing salty air tinged with Hawaiian Tropic.

Sometimes you can connect with a place for the opposite reason—it's so unfamiliar, so unlike anyplace you've ever been before, that it speaks to you. You're a stranger in a strange land, and yet that land is communicating with you somehow. Key West was like that for me. I'm thinking about my first trip there because when I stepped outside early this morning, a blustery wind was blowing through the palm trees we planted in our garden—specifically to remind us of the coast. This time they reminded me of that faraway island, particularly an early evening walk when the sky was growing dark, and the palm trees were blowing in the night breeze, and I was surrounded by beautifully weathered old wood-frame houses with their tall, shuttered windows and deep porches. You walk through a place like that, and you just feel it—incredible people have lived here, dramatic events have unfolded here. For heaven's sake, PIRATES have hidden out here. 

Some of these very houses survived the devastating 1935 hurricane that destroyed Flagler's fabled railroad. Unbelievable—a marvel of modern engineering crumbled in the storm but these old houses made it through. My imagination went into overdrive. Who lived on this street back then? Where did they come from? How did they weather the great storm? Did they stay on the island afterward or leave here for good?

Key West is the only place I've ever been where I felt completely disconnected from The Real World. And it made me want to transform a bit myself. By my second day there, everything in my suitcase seemed all wrong. I went to a little shop on Duval Street and bought myself a sundress and a pair of sunglasses to complement the one article of clothing I had brought along that did suit Key West—flipflops.

And away I went—travelling alone, an island unto myself on an island out in the sea. And it all came back to me when a morning wind blew through the palm trees in my backyard and made them go to talking:)

[Image by Robert Goosney @ Freerangestock.com]

Comments

[Candy Hicks]

Val ! ! ! I feel the same way about the coast and the wind and water and smell. LOVE THIS.
BRAVO ! ! ! !
Have you written a book about the coast?? IF you do I want it tooooooooo.

Thanks for sharing ! ! ! HUGS

[Valerie]

It gets to ya, doesn't it?? I know I haven't sold my first book, but a big chunk of the second one is set on the Gulf:) Is that optimistic or crazy of me?