Tomorrow morning, I get to board a plane and 2 hours later, land in the most heavenly of all heavens: Floridaaaaa! Although my amiga and I have just a few short days to soak up the beauty, it’s a few less that I have to spend in Chicago 🙂
So I guess now would probably be a good time to explain this whole unhealthy relationship I have with The Sunshine State and why it would need to get a restraining order if it were a human. If you’ve been a close friend of mine anytime after late 2014, feel free to tune out now because you, my poor thing, have heard enough. Or just keep reading because you’re my friend and you love me.
When I was 5, my parents took me to Redington Beach, FL outside of Clearwater. That was the day they ruined me forever.
It was a freezing (imagine that) January day in Chicago.. back in 2013. After graduating college and looking around for my dream job in a place without 4 seasons, I was a receptionist when an acquaintance of mine reached out, and I came to find out that he had moved to Florida. Being that I couldn’t take another day of the “Winter Wonderland” outside, his mom said it would be okay if I came down for a weekend. So the next month, I did. It was February and mid-70s. I could barely contain myself, but I also couldn’t enjoy it because I knew that I would have to go back to real life. When my plane landed on Sunday and the pilot said “Welcome to Chicago”, I burst into tears. My dad picked me up, and I told him I was gonna quit my job and move to Florida. He laughed.
I went into work on Monday and told my boss I was giving her my two weeks and I was moving to Florida. She laughed and asked if I got a job offer. I said no. She asked me what I was going to do for work. I said I didn’t know. She asked who I was going to live with. I said I didn’t know. She stopped laughing, asked me if I was serious, and when I said yes, she wished me luck. When I came home and told my dad I quit, he laughed and didn’t ask anything else. When my mom came home and my dad heard me tell HER I quit, he lost his shit. I spent the rest of that night listening to different versions of how stupid I was.
I could go into quite a bit of detail here, so I’ll speed it up. In the next two weeks, I found out my aunt had a summer condo in Madeira Beach – just blocks from where I fell in love 20 years earlier – and she would rent it to me until I found a place. I contacted a recruiter in Tampa, who I ended up meeting with on a Monday and accepted a job offer by that Friday. #nailedit
In March, absolutely all of my dreams had come true. And things just got better with time. I very quickly made INCREDIBLE friends, I was making good money, and I spent my nights in the pool after dinner and then crossing the street to sit on the beach to listen to the waves crash before I went to bed. Trust me – the way you’re imagining it is exactly as perfect as it was.
In June, my family came down to move me into the condo I can kinda forced them into buying. My bestie and new roommate, Brian, would pay their mortgage off while we made it into a home and continued to lay in the pool while our dinner grilled and drinks melted in the sun. Still perfect, right? Life was a fairy tale. It gets better. “Winter” was a blast. No boots, no coats, no problem. I still got a tan in November at 5 pm. I mean imagine a New Years where you’re wearing a dress and NOT shivering. For the first time for as long as I could remember, I wasn’t just content – I was HAPPY.
And then Brian died. It was the morning after Superbowl Sunday, and I was on my way back to work from finally getting my license plates when his dad called to give me the worst news I could have imagined. He had crashed into a tree just feet from the gate to our house. I was numb. I left work, crawled into his bed, and sobbed. For hours. I drank myself stupid and then cried some more. Brian and I weren’t romantic, but it’s hard to describe the kind of love I had for him. In fact, ask anyone who’s ever met Brian for more than 10 minutes, and they’ll tell you the same thing. From that moment on, Florida was over. I tried to find a roommate, then realizing I could never have anyone else live in his room, I tried to find a new place. Months later, and nothing was working. So, thinking that my family would help me, I came back to Chicago. Although few days go by that I don’t think about him, getting out of Clearwater helped me deal with losing the most incredible kid I’ve ever met. But I didn’t realize how much else I was giving up by coming back.
So here I am now.. still in Chicago and still hating it. I have more to lose now – I love having everyone back in my life, I love my boyfriend, and I have an amazing job. Will I ever move back to Florida? No. But the people I’ve met remain a huge part of my life, and Florida will always have a huge spot in my heart. Hence the obsession, the beach house décor, the constant visits, and the nonstop bringing up of memories that were and always will be the greatest times of my entire life.