A series of essays.....
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| HOMEOWNERS IN ORLANDO |
.....as seen through my eyes!
By: Jacqueline E. Hughes
Prior to moving down to Orlando, my husband had to put up with a mad person.
“People don’t travel down to Florida to live,” is how I would counter his attempts at reasonability. “People travel down there to vacation, right?” We’d, actually, been doing just that for almost twenty-five years with our two, young daughters while we owned a week’s timeshare condominium on Sanibel Island, Florida.
After much kicking and screaming, and abject resistance on my part, and old fashioned wooing on his, I conceded after nearly a year. Our youngest, was just entering her freshman year at Michigan State University and I was bound and determined not to abandon her at this critical time in her life. Also, I was enjoying my job and was hard-pressed to leave it, our daughter, or the state that I had called home for so many years.
The ‘magical’ part (pun intended) was that our oldest daughter had secured a job with Walt Disney World after graduating from MSU and was just beginning a ten-year-long career with the company. Having her near helped me through the depression I’d been feeling about having to relocate.
And so, this journey to the City Beautiful (Orlando’s nickname), Theme Park Alley, and more people from all over the world than you could possibly imagine in one small space, began. It was nineteen hundred and ninety-seven when my husband drove down to begin his new job as Project Manager with Picerne Development. Our oldest daughter followed him down after accepting an Internship with Walt Disney World. I was, happily, up North trying to figure out how it happened to be that I was, suddenly, living all alone with family scattered here and there. And, then....it was time to move and join Dan in Orlando!
Moving itself was a no-brainer. The company moved everything we’d been collecting as a family for over thirty years and we had it divided between our new apartment and an air conditioned storage unit until we had a plan formulated as to where and when we moved into our own home. “Got to learn the lay of the land first,” I would say. “I have no clue which area of this sprawling city I want to live in! And, not knowing a single person down here to help fill us in, this is going to take some time.” Dan did agree with this.
Even as depressed as I was about having to change my life so completely, as well as leaving our youngest in college up in East Lansing, I knew that, eventually, I needed to find a job. The simple act of employment really turned things around. My concentration was not centered around ‘poor me’ anymore; it was about working once again, being with other people, and saving money for our new home. For the first time in many months I felt totally alive!
Two years in and with steady weekly deposits into our savings account, we were ready to take the piano out of storage and become homeowners in Orlando!
As our oldest daughter spread her wings and climbed the corporate ladder, we had two years to figure out where we were going to plant our Floridian roots and chose to build our ‘forever’ home on the East side of the city with convenient highway access to anything and everything of importance to us.
Every night for four months, we would meet at our construction site to see the progress on our new home: “Perfect timing. Thought you were going to be late,” I chided. “You’re the one who had to drive all the way from Celebration to get here. That’s almost forty-five minutes across town on the 417! Let’s go see how much they accomplished in there today,” he said. How excited we were, and to think that building on our dreams within those four, cement block walls (eventually, to be covered in stucco) with the plumbing pipes sticking out of the cement slab on the ground....I felt I was going to be living on the other side of the moon! Pipes were supposed to be stuck somewhere between the wall studs or in the ceiling! And, not being able to have a basement was culture shock for me.
Our oldest daughter met her future husband here. They were married on the west side of Orlando and gave us two of the most beautiful and brilliant grandchildren here. Having decided to follow an alternate career, however, they moved to Michigan and now thrive not far from where her sister resides. Our youngest, found the ‘love of her life’ in Michigan, married him and produced three adorable and accomplished children......including twins! And, then there were ‘five’ of the most precious reasons to ever reconsider making grand changes in our lives.
Dan retires this year. The pulse of life ebbs and flows with the tides that pull at the vast seas surrounding this semi-tropical peninsula we call home. Changes are coming along the horizon and we either accept them gracefully or remain basking in the Floridian sunshine forever, our family far away in Michigan.
A typical conversation would have gone something like this:
“Did you know this is the longest we’ve been in one home together throughout our married life? We’ve been down here for over twenty years, worked and played hard, and created a ton of memories,” Dan said, continuing the running theme of our Saturday morning coffee-fest while lounging in the room we, lovingly, call our library.
“I do,” I replied. “But, my question is, haven’t we done all this the opposite way around? Don’t most people retire and then move down here to relax and live? I feel like we’ve been on a perpetual vacation all of this time. I kind of like it, Dan. I don’t know if I can take the Michigan weather anymore.”
“We’ve been very fortunate. But, I think life itself is calling us back up there with all of the kids. Hey, I remember having to convince you that moving down here was a good thing to do. You hated me for pulling you away from up there!”
“My heart was there, Dan. Our ‘baby’ was still there and I felt numb and disoriented when I knew it was time to commit to the disruption of our family by leaving her and making a life down here.
Looking me square in the eyes, he asked, “Can you make that same commitment to our grandchildren now? Will you pull the ties that bind us here gently apart and help me create a new life surrounded by the people we love?”
“I can do that.” I paused, thinking for a moment. “Do you remember that mad, depressed woman you had to convince that Orlando could be a great place to call home? For nearly a year I would fly down to visit and you’d take me to plays, soft jazz concerts at Leu Gardens Park, with long, sunny drives down the Florida A1A where we’d make stops to walk the beach hand-in-hand and end up hauling tons of sand back into the car before making the trip back to your apartment? I want to feel that warmth again; always keep it alive in my heart.”
“I remember you kicking and screaming all the way down here! You weren’t very happy for quite some time, as I remember.”
“You dropped me in the middle of a fire pit and then flew off to West Virginia and Mississippi for the week for work! Orlando was in a dry spell and fires were flaring up all over the outskirts of the city,” I said, clutching a pillow to my chest as I recalled those frightening, early days.
“I know. You told me it was like I’d left you in the bowels of hell when I flew off to work every Monday.”
“If it hadn’t been for Ali being so close, I would have gone completely crazy! Our daughter helped me keep some semblance of sanity. Then we built this beautiful house together and I, finally, got the chance to decorate a home just the way I wanted to after all these years.”
Smiling at me, “It’s difficult to change. It’s hard to just let go of so many years of memories, isn’t it?”
“Yes. And because of that, you now have another crazy, mad woman on your hands! Only, this time, I’m kicking and screaming in the opposite direction...because, and don’t tell me otherwise, we both feel that Orlando is now our home in so many ways.”
“I agree, wholeheartedly, but after retiring, there isn’t a good enough reason for us not to be up North with all of the kids, my brothers and their families, and all of our good friends. Our lives will be full. Our lives will be complete and we’ll have, definitely, come full circle.”
“You’re right,” I said. “Of course, you are. What I need to do is get over the huge hurdle of retirement, selling this home, and dealing with the intricacies of packing up twenty years of memories. Twenty years of happiness.“
“Yes? And......?” he inquired with a quizzical looking grin on his handsome face.
“If I believe enough in ‘us’ and understand that being a family once again is our highest priority....then, and only then, will it be easy for me to fill up boxes and bins with all of our amazing Florida memories and begin moving ‘twenty years’ of our lives up North.”
“At the end of all our hard work will be the ultimate prize,” he explained. “Those five shining faces accompanied by a million kisses and hugs will surely warm us both up every day of the year!”
“I know. Their love for us and our love for them will always be far greater and much more meaningful than having the Floridian sun shining down like every day is a golden summer’s day. Hey, I love you, too, Papa! Let's get some boxes and I'll start packing some books...."
Copyright © 2018 by Jacqueline E. Hughes
All rights reserved
