Time Marches On

Wow, is it already February 22nd? My dad turns 81 today. How in the world did that happen? How could it be that I'm 51 when just yesterday it seems that I called my parents with excitement to tell them that their first grandbaby was born. That baby is now 20 years old. He has a 17 year old younger brother who will graduate high school in 3 months. Now I have a six year old granddaughter and two more little granddaughters on order, due to arrive March 1st and June 23rd. <Big smile> I remember thinking with a laugh that I would be THIRTY FIVE in the year 2000. How old! Now I smile and think that it's 17 years past that beacon of old age. My skin is wrinkling but my mind is wiser. My body is slower but my heart is bigger. It's been a good ride overall. I've raised a family, learned about many of the things that I found interesting, seen a few interesting places, and knocked a few things off of my bucket list. Not bad.

However, options for me are closing. It's hard to be on a boat without sea sickness, I cannot join the military, and I don't have time to go to school and start a new career (not that I want to). Nowadays I get excited at the future possibilities for our children instead. I enjoy slowing things down rather than ramping them up. The big excitement for me is sleeping until I wake up on my own. There really isn't much I want for my birthday or Christmas because I'm happy with what I have and I have amassed most of what I want and need. I have to say that while I miss youth, life can be pretty sweet even now, in my 50s. I'm happy!

We have been on the road since mid-November, 2016. MARIS has become a beloved, cozy little roost for Michael and me. Our fur-children Roxy, Iris, and Skye probably miss the acreage and the dog door but they do love being closer to us. We have a routine now. I get up when the dogs wake me up with lots of collar/tag shaking, a few whimpers and a couple of times standing on their back legs to peer into the bed to see if I'm awake. We walk to the dog park and take care of business and walk to the water to check out the seagulls roosting on the posts in the water. If we're lucky there will be other dogs to play with along that track. Finally, we return to MARIS and I feed them. Then they rest and then spend some outdoor time on chains. Iris gets diaper-free time. Life is good for them also.

We still don't know exactly where we will head when our time here at Keys Palms is up the end of March. We're on the non-plan plan. There are a few things going on in March that will have a bearing on things. First will be the birth of Eleanor, my sweet granddaughter, around March 1st. I want to try to head over to see her. I cannot wait to hold a newborn again! However, Michael will have a little surgery around the middle of March, which interferes with my reserved visit to see Eleanor. I'll have to work that out. I believe everything will be good by the end of March. Michael should be all healed up. Will we do a civil war battlefield tour? Perhaps. Will we move up the east coast of Florida and stay in different parks along the way? Maybe. We do intend to go visit my beloved father. I haven't seen the folks in "way too long."

We are back at Keys Palms resort right now and parked in the

very same spot we were in before. It's a thing of wonder to have this good a view of the water and to also be about 30 feet from the hot tub and pool, and to have the internet router just outside our coach. There is no actual beach but the pool and hot tub are full of clean, cool water and we have an amazing view of the gulf of Mexico so I really don't miss being on a beach. We have met a few of the folks around here.

One couple, Gary and Sue took an old bus and renovated it, adding an awning and some pin striping to the outside and completely renovating the inside. I thought it was a pretty cool retro bus.

The scamper-mutts miss being on a beach, though. It was dog heaven for them to be allowed to freely run on the beach, chasing sea gulls and rolling in seaweed. Iris earned herself a new nickname, "Sandstorm Iris" because she would roll in the seaweed, feet gleefully jackrabbit kicking in the air to the left and to the right. Then she would stand up, squat for a second and, despite her incontinence, she would manage to squeeze a few drops out. That would send her into a spree of sand kicking alternating kicking each back leg, making two foot rooster tails behind her. Her elated spirit emanating from her ancestral canine urges to fling up sand and to roll in wet, smelly seaweed. In those moments, she became a whole, fulfilled dog again.

I'll finish this post with a couple of interesting things about the Florida keys for your visualization if you have never been here. First, the inhabitants of the keys do not go by street addresses all that much. They go by mile markers. I was taking the dogs to the groomer this morning and the groomer asked where I lived. I replied that we are staying down the road at the Keys Palms RV resort. She replied "Oh, that's mile marker 104, isn't it?" It's kind of interesting and different so if you want to sound like a bona fide native, use this little tidbit while traveling here. To look like a native one has to have a modest tan rather than the here-for-one-week-marathon-burn/tan. The other interesting thing is that all along the keys there are wild chickens walking around. Not wild turkeys, deer, rabbits, or other normal wildlife. I'm talking the elusive wilde-chickens. Colonel Sanders chickens. They are in the grocery store parking lot on the grassy medians, they are in the grass by the convenience store , they are walking all around the houses in Key West. I would expect to see this in third world countries along with abandoned dogs, but in the Florida Keys? I guess they don't know I see them as dinner and/or sunrise alarms. I haven't tried to approach one. They don't seem to be afraid of people, but they haven't met our fearsome border collies. Roxy and Iris would have a dozen of them herded into a shopping cart return in less than ten minutes, I'd bet!