Moody Meow

Today my Florida ties erode. My Uncle, a resident of Miami since the his early childhood, moves to North Carolina in search of better schools for his kids, to escape from the influx of immigrants (but they would never mention this out loud to me because of my lineage), to discover a fresh opportunity in the bar/restaurant business, and to find respite from the heat and hurricanes. My grandparents go with him, for he has helped in taking care of Grannie for a year now, because Gramps just can’t manage her care alone.

As of right now, my Grandfather is in the hospital in Miami with double pneumonia, and is still recovering from surgery to remove the cancer from his lungs. He had his operation on the 12th. My Grannie will stay with friends during the move so that my uncle and his family can transport the house unencumbered. That being said, my Grandfather will remain in the hospital until they release him, at which time my other uncle will fly to Miami and drive him to his new home. I don’t really know how the surgery went. I do know the double-pneumonia and heart issues are locking Gramps in a hospital. The world, his world, spins without him. Eventually he will all make it back up to the Carolinas….eventually.

When my mother and I spoke of this the other night, I grew sad. I’ve bad-mouthed Florida for years. I’ve tried to get out of this state by slowly moving northward. But my Grandparents and Uncle always lived in Florida. Their homes remain intrinsically linked to my childhood memories. The visits to Mickey’s bars. The trips to various homes of family friends. All punctuated by palm trees and bright polyester. Forever linked in my memory are the musical tinkling of ice on the sides of sweaty glasses and the sounds of a pool erupting as giddy, screaming children plunged into its cool depths. But that was a long time ago. I’m no longer that child. They are no longer the people in those memories. All of that has faded like the paint on Grandpa’s old stationwagon.

I also found out that Uncle Al died. He was the husband of Grannie’s best friend, Jonie. Aunt Jonie (because you never called people by their first names – all Grannies friends were family to us) died of breast cancer when I was eighteen. After her death, he lost touch with the family, abandoning their relationship because of the painful memories it brought him. I hadn’t seen him in over ten years. When I was about four I visited Aunt Jonie and Uncle Al one summer with Grannie. I dressed everyone up in my garish plastic jewelry. Even staid Uncle Al, deeply catholic and severe, cracked a smile when I attacked him with my sky-blue clip-on earrings.
And they always had mint candies.

No one thought to tell Mom or me or anyone else that Al died. Too wrapped up in their own madness, my Uncle and Aunt just can’t see anyone outside their small, loud world. As a result, I still don’t really know how my Grandfather fares, and I didn’t even get the information about Al’s funeral. The disconnect is painful.

So, I am imbued with melancholy. The ties that bind me to Florida erode with each moon rise. I don’t know why it was such a comfort to me that my Grandparents remained in Miami, but somehow, it was a reason to head south. I doubt that I will return to south Florida for any reason now. My friends still throughout the area, but even they are not enough of a pull for my return. Before we move north, I may make one more journey, just to put to rest some of the ghosts that still haunt me. Then again, maybe I won’t.