Bent Trees at Little Talbot
Florida was always a special place for me. As a child growing up in central Mississippi our annual trips to the beach were a bit of magic and a lot of mystery. At the crack of dawn Mama, Daddy, my brother and sister and I would load up the Pontiac and head south down Highway 35. We would hardly make it to Carthage before one or all of us started throwing up. I’m not sure if it was the lack of seat belts or the constant stream of smoke that drifted onto us in the back. Nevertheless we would get dosed with dramamine and hope for the best.
There was an obligatory stop in a small Alabama town for lunch. It captured our imagination because it looked like a ghost town. There was a cafe there named EAT. And we did.
Mid-afternoon found us in Destin. Endless dunes of sugar-white sand, a couple of palmetto roofed beer shacks on the beach, a few motor-lodges and some concrete block rentals were it. That was Destin then.
The dunes went on forever. As kids we would trek into the wild dunes and explore. Creatures we never saw in Mississippi owned the place. Ghost crabs and periwinkles scattered along the shore. Armies of Fiddler crabs fought battles along the margins of inland sloughs. Turtles and snakes of all kinds left tracks through the sand. It was wild. This was Florida.
Wekiva Reflections.
Geography offers Florida as a environment unique in the world. It holds not only the tail end of Appalachia but also the gateway to the tropics. The wilds of the central panhandle offer species pushed down from the far north while the south shares species with the Caribbean Islands. It’s a long state but its boundaries hold a wealth of life.
Storm at Crystal River
Florida came into existence about the same time that our species drifted into the area. Estimates show that Florida has been occupied by Homo sapiens for more than 14,000 years. It existed as a paradise for humans for thousands of years with massive amounts of available protein and a plethora of native digestible vegetation. Its climate also offered a suitable growing season for crops traded throughout the region.
Bent Palm at Lake George
As an artist I find inspiration in the wild places of the fragile peninsula. I’ve expanded my excursions from those early days on the western end of the panhandle to the mangrove estuaries and rivers of grass in the Florida Everglades. My access points for forays into this magical world are, more often than not, parks. City, County, State and National.
St. Johns River at Lemon Bluff
There is a movement afoot by the governor and legislature to redefine our magnificent state parks. The powers-that-be want the parks to become playgrounds for residents. They are trying to disturb the natural lay of the land and add golf courses, pickleball courts and disc golf. The fragile ecosystems of the parks would be lost forever.
Fighting these bad decisions should be a top priority for those of us who revere the natural world. We offer a suggestion that instead of spending billions of dollars to rape the parks why not spend a fraction of that money and hire naturalists so that we can teach our community about these treasures. It’s much more conservative at all fronts.
Most of us with ten years or more in Florida know this is just a giveaway to the Governor’s backers, one that would destroy what’s left of public lands for the benefit of a few. And taxpayer monies would be siphoned off into the pockets of those same. Jeb Bush touted it, as did Rick Scott when they were governors. But back then, there was bipartisan consensus against it. And the public protested vigorously. As has come to pass, the current slew of the majority party here in Florida don’t care about the public. They are not servants of the People.