Had to work Saturday morning but I got to spend 24 glorious hours in the Keys with the best friends a girl could ask for.
We had a host of things to celebrate — our fantastic, favorite, fabulous Philadelphian (whom I won’t insult by spelling any “F” words with “Ph” — I wouldn’t do that to my favorite former Florida girl. Anyway…) — flew down to visit our friend who just moved to the Keys. And the other two of us who still live on the mainland came down to surprise her.
We have so much to celebrate — a new home (with the Gulf of Mexico as the backyard!), two engagements, a string of birthdays and, well, awesome friendships.
Seriously, there was so much happiness I could just shit. 😉
We ate (brie-stuffed filet mignon for me), we drank (three, or maybe it was four, coconut mojitos — again, for me), we didn’t sleep but we greeted the sunset over the Florida Straits and the sunrise over the Gulf. There may have been another meal in there and some swimming for our earliest arrival and then shopping (and drinking Baby’s Coffee just outside Key West) for the last of us to leave. What more does a girl need?
I read somewhere that optimistic people lose weight faster than depressed people. I wonder if the corollary (or whatever fancy-schmancy word fits here) would hold true, then, that depressed people fatten up faster? Because the shrimp and cheese omelet at the Stuffed Pig and pie from the Key West Key Lime Pie Co. went to my ass faster than a normal person’s, I swear!
I want to move to the Keys. The pace is slow, the people are sweet, the island life is so detached from the mainland that it’s like being in a different country.
But I wonder whether I would grow to take it for granted. Or go nuts because civilization isn’t a 10-minute drive away (since I already live on the beach but in a way-more-populated area).
But then you look at a sunset like this, and know that any commute you have is on a highway like the one pictured, and it’s no wonder that the literary figures who also served as the characters in “Midnight in Paris” inhabited this charming area. I wouldn’t mind being the next Hemingway (without the tragic, gory demise, of course).
This is my happy place. I can’t wait to go back. Next weekend, anyone? 😉