on being a stereotype

In the Keys, everyone else, like me, is from another place.  It makes it interesting: unlike Kansas, where everyone has the same easy, unaffected manner of speaking, each person you meet has a unique accent.  Working at a resort employing three hundred people, i like to listen to the different dialects against one another.  In the HR office, is a young Texan & a middle-aged Bostonian.  My department, answering phones & manning the radios, is headed by a mother from Delaware & staffed with a grandmother from Michigan & a girl from Jamaica (among others, whom i rarely work with.)  Early in the morning, as the sun rises, i ride to work with men from the maintenance department who are from South Carolina, Tennessee, & New Jersey.

It's also great for conversation.  Asking where a person's from can easily segue into why they left, & what they're doing here.  You can learn a lot about a person very quickly.  Which is good, given that, for the first time in decades, i do not know everybody.  Quite contrarily: i know no one, & have little in common with anyone.  So i like being able to eat up minutes of small talk with that one question, & it's nice to get to know someone without needing to do much of the talking.

Obviously, this line of questioning usually veers next to where i am from.  The love of Kansas is deep in my heart, & i am not embarrassed by my newness to this place.  However, it's still awkward.  I think the main weirdness stems from the fact that i seem to be the only Kansan anyone has ever met.  Clearly, everyone has heard of the mythological state - Oz, evolution, tornadoes - but as far as i can tell, they assume nothing ventures to or from this bible-belt bread-bowl but wheat & beef.  I go suddenly from feeling like everyone else - transplanted like a seed in the island breeze - to feeling like an overwhelming stereotype - Kansas farm-girl with a boyfriend back home.  

Of course, no one knows about Lawrence.  About Thai/Vietnamese/Indian food, or gourmet coffee.  No one knows about my lip piercings, or that i break dress code with my 'extreme style' earrings: no one has seen me out of the 'island elegance' business-casual dress composed of all the clothes i own that could fit into the required category of 'conservative'.  It is a strange feeling, knowing no one, & being unknown to everyone.  To no longer be the girl back home, missing a few far away friends, but to now be the far away friend, missing everyone back home.

satisfied

Today, i feel as though i accomplished a lot.

After waking up early (a feat in & of itself) i thoroughly cleaned the condo.  Degreasing the oven knobs, scouring the formica, hand-mopping the floor.. the deeply satisfying type of clean.

After dipping myself into the industrial-sized vat of spf55, i rode Roomie's bicycle to the supermarket.  It's not terribly far - 4.5 miles - & considering that there aren't any hills at sea-level, it's a pleasant trip.  Biking over bridges, under palm trees, dodging iguana.  Satisfying.

Supermarket choices are: Winn-Dixie or Publix.  We shop at Publix, which seems comparable to the newly remodeled Dillons back home.  I can't complain, because they do have booze, & there is a smallish health-food section.  They also stock a few organic options in the produce, & best of all, they have the best yogurt selection i've ever seen!  Thankfully, since i'd say that these days, an easy 90% of my diet consists of yogurt & organic produce.  However, the last decade in a college-wonderland, i have grown accustomed to some particular eating habits.  Great Harvest bread, Vanilla-Blueberry granola from the Casbah (all within walking distance.)  A luxurious life indeed.  I found a granola that i thought would be good - anything with freeze dried berries can't be bad - but really, it was too crunchy & hurt my teeth.  

So, if you're reading this, i sure would like some bread & cereal from back home!

floridian day

Last night roomie tells me, 'Oh yea, you're goin with me to work in the mornin'.' I just go with it, & she tells me to bring my swimsuit. Which, seeing as how she works with dolphins, can really only mean so many things.
What it meant, was that i got to swim with a dolphin!!!
Roomie has worked at the research center for two years now (with an internship prior to that,) so i've been fortunate enough to squeeze in some dolphin interactions whenever i visit. In addition to a couple of 'meets' (a program where you stay pretty dry on the dock,) i've also been able to participate in a 'play' session, & i also had a 'paint' program, where a dolphin paints you a tee-shirt!! But never, have i been lucky enough to be in the water with a dolphin. Best birthday present ever.

I want to write this elaborate entry about the incredible experience, but, there's too many amazing things to write, & it's really a blog i'd rather leave to roomie.

But, almost as exciting, after she was off work, roomie & i played tennis!  Now.  To clarify, i have never played tennis.  I was really concerned that i would just frusterate Roomie, with my lack of racquet-eye coordination, & inability to keep the ball in play.  Turns out, she & i are equally great at tennis.  And, to clarify again, by tennis, i mean, 'jogging at stoplights'.  Realizing we weren't getting much of an aerobic work out, standing still while the other chases your serve, we just started 'keepin' up the hustle'.  It was great.

So, i'm a real Floridian!

pigeon shenanagains

Yesterday morning, there was a third pigeon on the balcony!!  This one was smaller than Burt, sort of a white & brown mottled bird.  However, like the other pigeon stranger, this one is also without tags. 

This morning, both of the strange birds showed up together!!  Well.  A line had to be drawn somewhere, & this is where Roomie & i decided to draw it.  No colonies of pigeons.  It's one thing to feed one lost pigeon (since that's what these professional pigeon persons said to do when emailed,) & it's one thing to clean up one bird's poop from your balcony.  It's an entirely different thing to be attracting random pigeons & surrendering your $800 view to the pecking & pooping of an ever-increasing flock.  And besides, Burt doesn't even do anything!  All day, he lounges around the balcony, pooping.  Doesn't he have bird things to do?  Get a job, jerk!!  (The only advantage i have over Burt is that i don't poop in the apartment.. so at least there's that.)

And so, the bird battle began.

It took both of us five minutes just to shoo him off the balcony at all, & even then he would just fly back to the other side.  Eventually, we wised up, putting on shoes & pushing all the furniture against the building, allowing us to run freely along the rail, shooing at him with our feet that no longer gingerly tiptoed around pigeon poopy traps.  Finally, we started scrubbing this week's bird turds off the balcony (& table & chairs & chaise lounge) while Burt watches, concerned from nearby balconies & fire escapes.  When he isn't cooing curiously from just outside of our reach, he's circling the building after his failed attempts to perch outside our rail.

Realizing that mere shooing would be unsuccessful in reclaiming our balcony, Roomie & i weigh our options:  Adopt a Cuban homing pigeon, or relocate said pigeon.

We open the screen door, & he just saunters right in.  Luckily, we thought to close said door, as our attempts to corral him into a box using tennis racquets failed & i snatched him up in a towel as he was fluttering against the screen.  As nonchalantly as we could manage, we carried this pigeon in a box into the elevator & through the lobby.  We drove a few islands away, maybe fifteen miles from our landmark of a building.  When we opened the box he hopped around for a few moments before taking off.  He flew in 5 or 6 increasing circles before disappearing.  Now all we can do is wait.

busy morning on the canal

At home, sitting at ground level on the porch, sounds came in a straight line, origin easily identified by their volume & directional line.  Eighty feet above the canal, noise floods in from all direction, the waves lapping against the coral intertwine with screaming gulls, shouts of people in their million dollar homes on the next island, & the fishing boats carting tourists into the great Atlantic, building one solid wash of noise, a cacophony from only one direction: below.

So, in the event that is of any interest to you at all...

A List of Sounds Overheard from the Canal:

- construction

- spanish-speaking workers doing said construction

- a barking dog that lives in a near-by sail boat

- a boat captain discussing the following items with today's clients:

- the weather

- what kind of fish they'll catch

- accidentally spilling motor-oil into the canal the last time he was maintenanced the boat

- his new haircut 

- "do it from the top, or you'll kink it!" (i think he was talking about a hose?)

- the color of his hands after this week's sunburn

- "it was nasty, but i had to do it.. it was just a bunch of muck." (i have no idea what this line was in reference to)

- and of course, the incessant screaming of birds

pretty girl on the side of the highway

I am tired, sunburnt, & completely discouraged.

Yesterday morning, I went for an interview at a swanky resort.  It was really encouraging.  Not only does this place have an HR department, but at my interview (which took place at it's scheduled time,) i was asked questions regarding my qualifications, interests, favorite & least favorite jobs, you know, interview questions!  The polite, professional HR recruiter told me that there were two guest-services positions he had in mind for me, & scheduled an interview with the department heads for this morning.

Still without a car, & having reached the bottom of my shallow bank account (leaving me zero dollars for cab fare,) Roomie dropped me off a few hours early as she drove to work.  This is fine, i still had the Kerouac to finish, & it gave me some solitude in which to conduct a private conversation with the Beau i left back home.  What i didn't realize, was that the terribly weak cellular signal on the island was sucking the battery from my phone 4x faster than usual.  So, a short, frustrating conversation later, my phone is already dead.

The interview its self was fine.  I spent about 45 minutes talking with the resort manager in a very professional, interviewy fashion.  Unfortunately, the department heads aren't able to make it to the meeting, so he'd like me to come back tomorrow & meet with them.  Fine.  A third interview is practically a sure thing, so.  Fine.

Let's recap:

1. Phone is dead.

2. Money is zero.

3. I am stranded on an island 10 miles from the one i live on.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the Keys, let me point out what makes this last bullet an issue.  The major keys are connected by the Overseas Highway (or US HWY 1.)  This means that you take cars (not boats) everywhere you go.  Not having a car severely limits one's ability to get from one place to another.  There is no bike lane, there is no sidewalk, in most places, there's barely a shoulder.  It's a two-lane highway spanning across the ocean. 

There's no one in the HR office for me to ask about the bus schedule, so i think i'll be a tough girl, & just walk the five miles to the next island where Roomie works.  The beginning of the walk is fine, the first channel still has the original bridge intact, so i have a nice stroll far away from the highway.  Unfortunately, after the bridge there is elaborate road-work that i am not tough enough to try & wheedle my way through.  

Turning around, i walk back to the resort, where i find someone who knows very little about the bus schedule, but assures me that at 2:45 it stops on the highway in front of the resort.  I kill the next two hours reading in a giant banyan tree, which helped make this day seem more like an adventure, & less like a disappointment.  Sadly, it was by far the highlight of my day.

Not wanting to miss the bus, i walked back to US1, crossing the busy highway right at 2:35.  Not wanting to risk standing on the roadway, & being too afraid to perch on the guard-rail, I took a seat on the coral boulders between the ocean & the traffic.  Almost immediately, a man in a BMW with a thick middle-eastern accent pulls over & offers me a ride, which i obviously declined.  Surprisingly, no one else pulled over while i waited.  Instead, there was a steady stream of whistles, honks, & catcalls during the two hours i sat waiting for a bus that never came.  It was horrifically humiliating.  It was everything our mothers warn us not to do.  It was awful.

Finally, at 4:30, i decided that i oughtn't risk my only chance to catch a ride home with roomie, & start walking.  Thankfully, the construction had ended for the day, so i was able to walk along the side of a major highway with little impediment.  Five miles later, the best thing that could have possibly happened, did.  Parked in the lot of a keyzee general store, was my cab driver from yesterday.  He recognized me as i walked by, & insisted on giving me a ride home.

So now i'm exhausted.  Sunburnt. And entirely discouraged.

jobless

It has become immediately apparent that my planning wasn't as thorough as it ought to have been before moving across the country.  Mostly my financial planning.  Not only did i just plain not save as much as i had initially intended, but i spent a lotmore getting down here than i had expected. 

Additionally, i'm starting to worry about my employment prospects.  Never in my life have i worked to get a job.  I'm young, good looking, & smart, on the rare occasion i have to actually look for a job, i have no problem landing one that i want.

Before i left home, I had applied for a job taking pictures at the Dolphin Research Center.  Having never had a 'resumé' before, i got over-intimidated & spent weeks perfecting it, editing it, sending it off for proofreading, re-editing it.  So, by the time i sent it in, they had already started interviewing for the position & i didn't make the cut.  Lesson learned.

I had been keeping an eye on the local classified ads, scanning the employment & cars sections daily for new additions.  I was not surprised to see that most of the jobs said 'no phone calls' or 'please apply in person'.  My parents taught me that how you apply for a job is just as important as how you interview:  always look nice, speak with a manager when possible, fill out your application in house (don't take it home & wrinkle it all up,) so i always did, & when i started to be responsible for hiring, i would always take those things into account.  So, I decided that i'd rather follow proper procedure & charm the pants off of these employers my first week in the Keys.

Wrong.

Firstly, there aren't a lot of jobs.  Of any kind, not to mention those that i am actually capable of doing (although that ad for 'able bodied workers needed for lobster boat, NO DRUNKS!' keeps catching my eye, i don't think it's for me.)  Plus, not having a car really limits my options.  So, in addition to the gallery job in Islamorada that i never heard back from, my roommate drove me around Saturday to get applications of places that are within reasonable walking/biking distance: two of them.  One of them, not receptive at all.  Definitely not hiring.  The other, a keyzee restaurant (where the waitstaff has to wear hawiian shirts,) seemed super receptive, the manager handing me an application saying, 'Why don't you bring this by tomorrow around 3 or 4 & we can have a chat, I'm sure we can find someplace for you.'  Hooray!  Exciting!  No.  Sunday, i pay a $10 cab fare to be driven to a place i can see from my balcony (which sounds super lazy, but it's on the next island over, so even though i can see it, & it's maybe a half mile from our apartment, it's a two mile walk to get off my island, across the canal, & down that island to the interview... & i didn't want to be sweaty!)  I arrive, on time & adorably hirable, only to have him take my application & say, 'Thanks, we'll be in touch.' as he walked away.  I tried not to act disappointed, instead, i saved all my self-pity for the 45 minute walk home.

Luckily, the walk turned my self-pity into self-motivation & i spent the next day & a half working out a complete (ten year) job history, as well as perfecting two different resumés, one for management, & one for service.  Also lucky, a restaurant on the island where my roommate works had put out an ad for servers!  I called the number & arranged (what i hoped was) an interview for this morning.

I rode to work with my roommate & walked to the resort [sidenote: Amazing walk.  This island has a bike/walking trail separated from the highway by a wooded area, so it was like walking through a jungle!  It made my day.] Intentionally, i arrived about 15 minutes early, only to find the restaurant locked.  Undeterred, i sat & read, assuming that the guy would show up closer to interview time.  When he did not, i decided to call his mobile after the girl at the front desk said he would be out of town for a week.  He was on his way in, if i didn't mind waiting, so i sat back down to read.  Moments later, i hear some lady with a thirty-year whiskey-voice calling the same guy, with the same concern.  Discreetly, i looked at the balcony entrance to see a keyzee lady (too tanned, fake blonde hair) in a tee-shirt, shorts, & sneakers saying that she was scheduled to meet him at 11:00 or 11:30 (it was 10:35.)  Moments later, she shouts at me from the balcony, "Who's the author of your book?" Politely, i replied, "Kerouac, i'm reading On the Road." Her reply, "Oh.  Is that like, a mystery book, or a romance novel?" And then proceeds to ramble about how much she likes to read & where am i from because i am obviously not from around here because the color that my legs are & oh she's from iowa but hasn't been back there for twenty years, multiple times apologizing that she didn't mean to interrupt me, but then just continuing to talk until the manager arrived.  Needless to say, she was a bit confused, & maybe disappointed to realize that this young woman in a nice sundress was interviewing for the same position as she was.  It was an awkward 15 minutes.

But, to end on an upnote, while i was on the beach today (trying to adjust my leg color to a more 'local' tone,) i got a call from the keyzee restaurant on the next island, setting up an actual interview.  Let's hope it goes just as well.

escape velocity

In the twenty-six years that i have been alive, i have lived within twenty-six miles of where i was born. From four to seventeen, I attended the same school district. My parents & grandparents still live on the land where I was raised (where my own mother grew up.) The past nine years are the only i have spent living in a city, a college town of about 90,000.

Now, i am in the process of extricating myself from Kansas to live with a friend in the Florida Keys.

Anyone who has ever lived in & moved from a little oasis is surely empathetic to my situation: excited to leave, terrified to be gone, & effing tired of talking about it. Obviously, the constant dialogue about the perfect weather & the ocean view is helping to keep my spirits high, & is a definite nudge towards optimism. However, working as a barista in a busy Downtown coffeeshop, i have started to feel like a broken record.

Besides the obvious resident-turnover that will accompany a Big-12 state school, there is a constant ebb & flow of townies who all have the same Dorothy desires. It is expected that you will move. And when you do move, it is expected that your take-off attempt will fail, & you will return, tuck-tail to the motherly embrace of her limestone alleys.

Unlike a lot of others who have come & gone in the years i have been here, i love this town. It cannot be overlooked, the obvious drawbacks of living in a university town: alumni, greeks, basketball, football, freshman, art students, business majors... Undeniably, the suffocatingly exponential expansion of the 'west side' is only getting worse. And, a small town, is a small town, is a small town. We may not be rural, but Downtown is tiny enough that everyone knows everything, personal & otherwise. The frequent farewell parties all share the same refrain, 'I'm just so tired of this damn town.' & 'I can't stand any of these effing hipsters anymore.'

Ridiculous. I have the most incredible life i could ask for here. I haven't owned a car in seven years, everything i need is within a five block radius of my amazing apartment in a pre-civil war house, & there is convenient & reliable public transit for the rare occasion when i am required to leave Downtown. We have a lively (albeit wheezy) art scene, & most importantly, the ability to sustain one's self by 'living locally' (groceries, restaurants, shops...) It's a town where you can barter! A community where you all live & work nearby, therefore, you know everyone! I lead a blissful, luxurious life here. I fully intend to come back someday to grow old here.
While I have yet to make any kind of decisions concerning kids & career, I feel safer assuming that someday I could have one or both of those. So, why wait until having them binds me irreversibly to the Midwest? I am aware enough of the passage of time to recognize that the now is an opportunity to save myself from becoming an elderly woman who settled down without exploring her options.

Mostly, I just hate winter. I hate being cold. I take it as a personal affront. As if every bone-chilling breeze, & soul-crushing ice-storm is an attack on me, as an individual. For a third of the year i wear long-johns, thermal socks, undershirts, sweaters, gloves, boots, a coat, & a thick scarf. It's suffocating! Not just the scarf over my mouth & nose (or the frozen air when scarfless,) but the layers & layers constricting your movement & rendering you as unsexy, & uncute as possible.
Do you know where they don't have winter? The tropical islands known as the Florida Keys.
And what they do have in the Keys, besides beaches, palm trees, sunshine, & crystal clear water? Weather that allows me to wear sundresses for two thirds of the year.