Staged

Thoughts from this weekend, after seeing my mama perform at the Monticello Opera House in the local production of Casablanca and my dad and stepmom perform at the Moon in a local soul review:

- I sort of wish I had a fez. I would wear it when I go out drinking.
- Some of the finest acting in Casablanca was done by Rick's chin cleft. I sort of couldn't stop watching it.
- My folks are damn talented.
- It's still tons of fun seeing nazis slapped, out-witted, or shot.
- If you go to an Opry House production and you have the option, get the dinner beforehand. That's some good grub. I hear the woman who supplies it is an old friend of my bro Billy - she runs a catering service in Monticello, and I keep meaning to ask her name.
- I liked the backlit bottle rack part of the set particularly - simple effect, but it looked really good.
- Now I want to actually rent Casablanca and watch it all the way through.
- The Moon has the best sound in town, but the worst drink prices.
- If you have a large room full of baby boomers and, for some reason, you need to get them all on the dance floor at once, play Mustang Sally. They'll all get right out there and start doing the hip shake dance.
- Middle aged guys in above-the-knee khaki shorts, polo shirts, and slip-on shoes with no socks make me laugh. And I have all the fashion sense of a crosseyed armadillo.
- The fun we make for each other is always better than the fun we hire others to make for us.
- David Schuessler looks like the love child of John Denver and Martina Navratilova.
- I've got some damn talented parents.

Lord, I Love a Parade

Any day that starts with paella for breakfast and women dancing down the street in feathers can't help but be a good day.

I woke up at 9 this morning, which, if you know me, probably shocks the hell out of you. I got my neighbor up, and we strolled on down toward the capital. Just past Call Street, we grabbed an empty stretch of curb and waited for the motorcycle cops to bip their sirens and start the whole thing. The local bagpipers set the pace - say what you will, and I know it's a funny looking instrument, but a good pipe band can give me goosebumps. There's a reason it was carried into battle to pipe the soldiers into the fray.

Behind them were a handful of the usual Tally suspects - beauty queens in open cars, the Rickards cheerleaders clapping and jumping, parrotheads - mixed in with folks dressed in the styles brought here when they were dragged or chased or lured into the US. Stilt walkers in masks, dancing and clowning to a Caribbean beat. Mexican families in clothing that still remembers the Mayans. A whole trailer of steel drums, music bouncing off the brick buildings like chimes. DJs from around the southeast on flatbeds stacked with speakers blasting Carnival beats followed by flocks of women decked with feathers, from small headdresses to giant, towering beasts and jungles on wheels draped over a dancer's shoulders. I have to admit, my neighbor and I followed our favorites all the way down to the judges' table and back around to the Adams Street commons.

And after the parade, food! Thank the Lord that I live somewhere I can eat a smalll mountain of paella with muscles, shrimp, pork and chicken stewed and spiced as yellow as the rice, peas, scallops, and fresh pico de gallo sauce for breakfast on a morning when you can feel fall headed our way. My neighbor grabbed a plate of jerk pork and we sat in the shade and peple watched and sipped lemonade and stuffed ourselves.

Now the question is, where the hell were you? All that music and food and color (and please do not forget the pretty ladies dancin and laughin) and most of Tallahassee skipped it. Y'all shoulda been there.

Dirt Mall

I woke up this morning wanting a pair of green bootlaces, a pack of nag champa, a bandana, and a peach. Okay, so mainly what I wanted was a reason to go to the flea market. Where else can you sip a draft Bud while browsing through 70s country records, hot pants that say "Rebel Girl", and framed posters showing the last supper as portrayed by characters from Scarsface, The Godfather, and The Sopranos?

After the intense heat we suffered through this past month, I've managed to convince myself that fall's pretty much here already. Even with sweat running down my back while I strolled between aisles, following my nose to the incense, soap, and African medallians booth, I found myself saying things like, "Sure is cool out today," and "Looks like we survived another summer." And in a funny way, it's true. A local knows these things. You can feel that little edge when a breeze hits just right - that promise that soon we can pull out jackets and jeans and not die of the heat. That hint that the fair's just around the corner (elephant ear, anybody?). That I'd better start planning my Halloween party.

Between the fine weather, the self-delusion, and the fact that I managed to get everything I needed for under $5, the flea market couldn't have been better. How do you think I'd look in those hot pants?

No Wallyworld on Gaines

Well halle-damn-lujah.

All Together Now

In 31 years, I've seen every old school Florida attraction and landmark I could. One of four kids and blessed with two sets of parents who love the funny little quirks of history as much as I do, I'm rooted as deeply in the soil of this state as the live oaks in my mom's yard.

With grandparents in Winter Haven, my family prefered the Belles and daredevil skiers of Cypress Gardens to the rat with the big price tag. I've been told that the hoop-skirted women began roaming the gardens there to distract from plants killed in one of those freezes that sometimes grips the state. True Florida ingenuity.

If you want a postcard image of how people have been inspired by our state's natural beauty to make their own visions a reality, Bok Tower, the bells singing in thick Florida air, would be first pick. (Confession time: when my sister and I were sprats and Granny took us to the Tower, there was a sibling scuffle and I kicked? pushed her down on? her knee, leaving her with a limp for the rest of the afternoon - I remember none of the details, but I'll bet my sister does!)

I could probably run the Wakulla Springs boats and do the speech, for as many times as I've been up and down that little chunk of river. ("We call those turtles 'soup-sized'...") The forts at St. Marks and St. Augustine gave details to my daydreams as a pirate-obsessed kid. Ever been up the Citrus Tower? I have, and I've still got a flattened penny embossed with their logo somewhere in a box of trinkets. I never got to go to Circus World, but I sure remember watching out the car window as we passed that massive tent-shaped buildings.

In November, when even the McDonalds would close down, you used to be able to get a cottage on Panama City Beach for mighty little cash. That was back when the pirate still sat on his treasure chest. When the Goofy Golf still scared the bejesus out of me with its concrete monster heads and Sphinx statue. (Seriously, I wouldn't go anywhere near the place - I was kind of a jumpy tot. Too much imagination.) I won't say there weren't already massive, trashy dance clubs and overpriced, overbearing condos crowding the strip - I'm just saying that I remember when it was still the Redneck Riviera, and pretty damn proud of it.

This past weekend, my mama packed up all 4 of us kids, plus my soon-to-be brother-in-law (a truly good guy) and our dad and we all rode down to Weeki Wachee Springs, crown jewel of old Florida. Not our first trip there and, goodness willing, not our last.

I'm not a graceful guy, generally speaking, but in the water I'm not bad. I don't remember learning to swim any more than I remember learning to walk (though I do remember wearing water wingies - don't put them on your ankles, it doesn't work). Watching those mermaids slip through water so clear it tricks the eye is like watching my own dreams. Unanchored to land, no mask, no tricks, just a little air hose and a whole lot of lung capacity. That's so much of what Florida really means to me. A little costuming, a little applied glamour (in the original, spell cast sense of the word), but under it all - people using their own strength and nature's inspiration to create miracles and wonders.

By taking us around the state, telling us the stories and showing us the sights, my family taught my sisters and I many things. To appreciate authenticity and not be fooled by plastic and flash. That our waters and trees make the best backdrop to any performance. That there is magic lingering, kept alive by those who believe, and plywood condos and animatronic cartoon characters aren't worth plowing under a swamp for.

Damn, I love this state.

That Time of Year

This week is like fruit basket turnover, Tally-style. All the students are coming in and all the locals are trying to find a cooler apartment than they already have. I helped a friend move out of her place on the 31st while the new tenant brought their gear in. It seems like everyone in town moved one place to the left.

Old school Tally apartments make me happy. Give me a small space (over a garage? carved out of a larger house? in a brick building down on Franklin and Park?) with hardwood floors, white walls, windows that actually open, and a big bathtub. I'll leave the game room, free internet access, strange roommates, plywood construction, overly chlorinated swimming pools, and gate guards to the college kids who don't know any better.

The Bounty of Our Land

Dad caught a mess of bream, and mama dredged them in cornmeal and fried them with fresh okra in her gleaming, black skillet. He and my kid sisters woke up at six on Sunday and beat the crowd to St. Marks, bringing home (at the expense of bright red sunburns) and shucking sweet scallops, enough for us all to have our fill once mama married them to butter and garlic. Tomatoes, green beans, and cucumbers grown right there in their Lloyd yard filled the salad with Florida sunshine. Fresh squash, chopped and molded into croquettes, and grits more cheese than corn filled the plate to overflowing. The whole meal started out with freshly made salsa (mason jars full, lined up on the kitchen counter from canning the day before) and ripe cherries and finished up with sliced fruit poured over angelfood cake and lemon squares from a friend.

All of us on a Sunday night, in and out of the bright kitchen, sisters dancing in the high-ceiling hall, my best friend and his wife telling stories and smoking cigarettes on the back porch while trains boom past, dad half asleep and smiling from all the hunting and gathering, mama slinging pans and doling out hugs and advice and gossip. So many blessings.