EG Simmons Regional Park, Ruskin FL
It has been a pretty quiet week; we are close to our ultimate Florida destination and are doing lots of nothing much. The weather has been beautiful and we are sure enjoying it. We are doing bike rides, some together and some on our own. In the evening we ride to Sunset Point, where we can watch the sun set over St. Petersburg across the south end of Tampa Bay. I have ridden to weekday Mass once and drove the truck another time. Other than that, we are enjoying being settled for two weeks. The solitude of our natural surroundings is a sanctuary allowing us to transcend “the world of 10,000 things” and focus on the genuine.
The motto of Florida’s state parks is The Real Florida; we scoffed at it when we first saw it last year. That was before we saw the unabated development of much of the coastline here. The reality of those developments is a sea change from what is being preserved by our national, state and regional parks. We must do all we can to preserve what is left of “pristine” America. Frankly, there is little that is pristine; vast amounts are “wilderness”, where vehicles are prohibited limiting human corruption.
This afternoon, Penny and I drove Punta Gorda, Florida, where her brother, Joel, and his wife. Lindy, live year round. Another brother, Dan, winters there and her parents, John and Shirley, normally do as well. Joel plays in a popular old time rock n’ roll band, the Gotta Luv It band. They had a gig at a waterfront venue, Hurricane Charley’s, so we took this opportunity to see them play. It was about an hour 45 minute drive; the place was packed and we had to wait almost an hour to get a table. But, we enjoyed the show, had dinner, listened to two sets, and then joined Dan to watch Bill Maher on HBO before crashing at Joel and Lindy’s for the night.