By Marla Boone
Contributing columnist
In 2008, approximately five seconds after our last ounce of good sense disappeared, Steve and I bought a house in Florida. Six weeks after that, Hurricane Donna swept into the state and swept right back out with our roof. This is not germane to the story but it does illustrate the tyranny of ownership, particularly when the thing you own is a thousand miles away.
Florida is known as the Sunshine State. It should be called the Euphemism State. Here are a few examples: manufactured home means double-wide trailer, lake means sink hole, and senior living means God’s waiting room. Just to prove irony isn’t dead, Florida has the deadly trifecta of the most double-wide trailers, (oops, I mean manufactured homes), the most hurricanes, and the fewest insurance companies of anywhere else on earth.
There are four main reasons to live in Florida: December, January, February, and March. There are also four main reasons not to live in Florida: (1) The Stand Your Ground Law in Florida is loosely interpreted to mean feel free to shoot at anyone who doesn’t look like you. Given the results of recent court cases, shooting other people is not so much legal as actively encouraged. (2) There are lots of smokers in Florida. ‘Nuff said. (3) There is a large population of elderly drivers (see above euphemism for senior living). Many of these drivers have not grasped the concept that the first number of the speed limit is not always four. Four is, however, in hours, the median amount of time those drivers leave their turn signals on. This averages out well because all the smokers are too busy dieseling pedestrians and bicyclists or lighting up their next cigarette to use any turn signal at all. It makes for a lively guessing game and allows one think more fondly of the elderly.
We’ve already discussed how vulnerable manufactured homes are to any wind stronger than a mere zephyr. There are three unwritten guidelines about which manufactured home to buy. Most important is a driveway large enough to park two cars. In the senior living communities (see above euphemism), the streets are exactly wide enough to get an ambulance through. This is not a coincidence. Parking is at an absolute premium and if your home’s drive can accommodate two cars, you are ahead of the game. Next in priority is proximity to wherever bingo is played. Bingo in Florida has become a blood sport. Folks get downright violent over someone across the room yelling “Bingo!” just one move ahead of them. It is more dangerous than the Stand Your Ground edict and that is saying something. The third thing is waterfront property. Except in Dubai, the fresh water supply of which strongly resembles central Florida, real estate is the one thing no one is making more of. People want to live on the water if only because that means there is at least one side of their house not cheek-to-jowl with another house. If there really were truth in advertising, these communities would not be called some fake bucolic name like Peaceful Acres. They would be called “Let’s See How Many Tiny Houses We Can Cram Onto Ten Acres.” Waterfront living is not without its perils. See euphemism number two. Most of the lakes in Florida are in reality sink holes. And if it can sink once…
There are repeated reports of houses, apartment buildings, dogs, and humans being swallowed whole by the earth. On a scale of one to ten, being buried alive in a Florida sink hole ranks somewhere below being carried off in a hurricane and slightly above being eaten by the denizens of all those lakes: alligators. No matter what the real estate agents tell you, every single lake in Florida has alligators. Alligators are large, carnivorous, perpetually ill-humored things. They will eat fish, turtles, other alligators, and your pet beagle.
Consider this your head’s up if you are considering a move south. And if you do suffer the fate of being carried off in a hurricane, please look for my roof while you’re being blown around. It’s still out there somewhere.
Marla Boone resides in Covington and writes for Miami Valley Today.
