Fifteen years or so ago, John, my late husband, and I (plus our dogs) were in year two of living in the modest RV we made into our home after Hurricane Katrina.
We found ourselves on the east coast of Florida, not far from the beach, deep in watery, palm-encrusted terrain at a place called Bulow RV Resort.
Calling it a "resort" was hopeful.
We nicknamed it “Von Shithole,” which was also a little overstated, since it wasn't terrible. But there was no cement pad to level your RV on, it was often muddy and the RV stations where you parked were a little random and haphazard.
The showers were left over from some 1950s state park situation, which we suspected this "resort" had once been, and wifi was only available around the office, so I would often work on my computer at a picnic table during the day.
They offered a special rate so we moved in for a few months in deep winter. We loved the area. Flagler Beach was down the street, St. Augustine down the highway about 30 miles. We'd previously been living in Tampa on Florida's Gulf Coast, which we adored, and before that, Birmingham, Alabama, and Destin, Florida, where I worked at a local newspaper.
This was the first year we got a full taste of the "snowbirds," the influx of RVers from wayyyyy up north who usually spend some or all of January through May in Florida to get away from the freezing winters where they live.
Florida's population swells by roughly 800,000 or more in winter due to the snowbirds flying south for the winter.
We were often the youngest full-timers living at any park we stayed in. We didn’t know anyone. These snowbirds, from Montana, Kansas, and Idaho, all knew each other. Von Shithole was their collective winter destination and they came down in a loosely organized group every year.
Their RVs and incomes were larger and grander than ours. These folks owned businesses or farms, moved their lives down South for the winter months, and settled in. Many had motorcycles and golf carts in tow.
They were salt-of-the-earth citizens, the kind who probably had a "nice truck" and a "work truck," toiled early mornings for a good income and were the backbone of their community. No doubt they had a new gun and old family recipes tucked in a kitchen drawer.
And boy did they love to party.
They'd make huge bonfires every night and drink until the early hours, hooting it up. Hardworking, flag-waving Americans on their own version of spring break.
They adopted John and me. They'd never seen the likes of us. They asked us questions like "What exactly do you do now?"
Artists were not on the list of people they were acquainted with. Still, they warmly embraced us.
There was always a celebration of something — anything — any excuse to have a shindig. They even threw a party for John's and my anniversary. because they wanted us to hang out with them, make BBQ, and drink. I admit we tried but couldn't keep up. I spent one night throwing up at 2 a.m. with John holding my (then) waist-length hair back as I barfed an alcohol-laden dinner into a plastic trashbin in our RV because I simply couldn't keep up with what we came to refer to as The Americans.
"Maybe this isn't our scene," I said to John in a weak voice.
"At least you tried," he said kindly, holding a damp washcloth to my forehead.
Just then our TV jumped off the stand in the RV bedroom because someone drunkenly bounced through our little area in a golf cart and clotheslined the park’s cable attached through the wall of the RV to our television set, yanking it tight, then flipping our flat-screen.
John left me with my buddy the trashcan and went outside to see what happened.
He found one of the Americans, a guy from Iowa who, although drunker than Cooter Brown, snapped into total adult mode and apologized, saying if he needed to pay for anything, including a new TV, he certainly would.
He reached for his wallet and John said no, just help fix the damage. It was minor. They fixed it pretty fast and Iowa Man actually went and told everyone not to drive their golf carts through that particular area. He even made a little warning sign out of an empty beer box. Everyone shook hands.
Our temporary village had unwritten rules and everyone followed them.
The Americans embraced everyone in their orbit, even as they took over the place. A local veteran lived in a ratty trailer on the edge of the RV park by a bayou. They all knew him. This particular year they came down to find the vet in the hospital and when he was released they discovered he had both legs amputated due to illness and diabetes.
The next day we all got together and built a ramp for the vet’s trailer and widened his front door for him. This happened spontaneously because it was the right thing to do.
John helped and because there were about 15 people working, it only took a few hours. I made and brought the vet some chicken soup and sandwiches.
I can't remember his name but I was wholly entertained by this quietly determined, legless, ex-military man with a constantly lit cigarette in his hand.
He probably wasn't long for this world, knew it, and planned to go out in a blaze of party.
I come from a military family and have a soft spot for vets anyway. He obviously was going to live his life the way he wanted and he didn't give a hot crap what anyone thought. I respected that.
I also discovered something. You didn't need legs to party with The Americans. He'd tear up to the nightly drink-a-thon in his modified golf cart like a NASCAR driver.
One night we woke up to a commotion after midnight. Apparently, the vet had attended the lunch drinking/eating session but hadn't shown up for the nightly shindig.
Worried, the party posse went looking for him with flashlights. Florida forests and bayous are beyond inky black at night and can be dangerous.
They found the guy on the ground outside his trailer.
His liquid lunch had done its work. When he got home he hopped out of his golf cart and, forgetting he had no legs, tumbled face-first onto the ground. He was nowhere near his wheelchair.
He lay there, right by the water (where a 16-foot alligator nicknamed “Giant Fred” had often been spotted by residents) until the Americans showed up hours later to pick his scrappy ass up.
Thank God they found him before Fred did.
The moral of this story is this: There is no moral. It's just a story. But it's a true tale of a place and time and if there's a takeaway, it's that even if people are different in lifestyle and how they make a living, even if these guys packed guns and I packed a pen, respect goes a long way.
Common courtesy and common sense matter. In some ways people aren't that different and living together isn't too hard if you just help one another out.