Editorial
Front Page - Friday, June 11, 2010
Are We There Yet?
Black and white
Jay Edwards
My keyboard desktop is filled with colors of the Florida panhandle – blues and greens of the gulf and sky; and sugar-white sand that goes on as far as you can see. It is a photo I took with my cell phone last October, when the only threats to the area were terrible winds with human names.
Now fear has a different color, one the opposite of sugar- white. It comes from miles below the warm gulf breezes that blow over and around the waves. It’s black, as in “Black Gold, Texas Tea,” and it’s uncontained and out of control, at least it still is as I write this. Thanks BP.
That desktop photo was taken from a perch at Blue Mountain, just east of Destin, where seagulls and pelicans fly by at eye level; and where every October, Monarch butterflies flitter past, on their colorful migration to Mexico.
Some mornings, with luck, dolphins can be spotted diving in and out of the waves, looking for their breakfast, to the delight of all.
Destin was the first vacation spot I remember as a child, and it was the first place we wanted our own children to see. The wonder in a child’s eyes the first time they see waves and endless water is worth much, priceless really.
We went every summer, always with friends who had young ones of their own, to the Destin Beach Club, which still sits on Scenic Highway 98, where it splits from the Emerald Coast Parkway. It was a short walk from the condo to our spot on the beach, where Mike the lifeguard lined up the blue canvass chairs. All of the men wanted to be Mike, never again wearing a shirt or cutting your hair.
Those vacations usually began by leaving Little Rock around four or five in the morning, after loading the cars the night before. I would carry the kids from their beds to a place in the back of the Wagoneer, or mini van, where they could lay down. It wasn’t safe, but we are the same generation that used to crawl under our wooden desks in case of nuclear wars, so driving around without seatbelts didn’t seem that crazy.
Our hope in leaving so early was that the kids would sleep a few hours. We never even got to Pine Bluff before their little heads popped up behind us.
Is there any better feeling than the first few hours of heading off for vacation? I remember the sun would be an orange sliver, just peeking over the horizon, as we drove through Pine Bluff. And it looked white-hot when we spotted the “Beware of Hitchhikers” sign near Cummins.
Through Dumas, McGehee, Lake Village and Eudora. Into Louisiana and Lake Providence, Transylvania (with the bat on the water tower) and Tallulah, where we caught I-20.
We drove through Vicksburg and Jackson, where we hit 49 to Hattiesburg; then 98 to Mobile, and the tunnel. At that point, still some three hours away, you crossed Mobile Bay and felt like you were there. I know lots of people who prefer Gulf Shores because you don’t have those last three hours. I’ve never been one of those people. If there really is a “Redneck Riviera,” it probably is Gulf Shores. I mean you are in Alabama. Destin is more like Shangri La.
We would usually get off I-10 in Pensacola and go through Gulf Breeze to 98, the Miracle Strip Parkway. It took a little longer, but those frequent glimpses of the beaches and whitecaps beyond were worth the time; and they made you forget how tired you were, after being in the car over ten hours.
Passing through Fort Walton I always looked for the Ramada. I never stayed there but visited some friends there once back in 1976. I found them at the bar in the huge swimming pool, behind the waterfall. I’ve never forgotten that for some reason.
After Ft. Walton comes the stretch that’s owned by the Air Force, with nothing for a few miles but road, sand and waves.
Then, suddenly, there it is, “The World’s Luckiest Fishing Village” - Destin - the peninsula that separates Chocawhatchee Bay from the Gulf of Mexico.
The bridge over Destin Pass, between the Bay and the Gulf, gives a view on a sunny day that still leaves me in awe. It alone is worth driving a bit farther.
So now, all of us, young and a little past young, wait and hope that the oil can be stopped, and that the damage won’t be too great or long lasting. So that the little piece of heaven in Okaloosa County will still
be there a hundred years from now, continuing to make memories for other generations that are just as wonderful as they have been for ours.
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