I received an email from an old friend who lives in Florida. She was a year ahead of me in school, when we were children, and moved to the west coast after college graduation with her husband. My parents were mentors to them both, and godparents to their daughter. When they retired they sold their house here and moved to Florida. Now they are trapped there and cannot sell to move back here where their daughter still lives. She has many health problems, and I feel for her dilemma. It was good to hear from her, but I haven't been out to the east coast in years, and I don't like Florida. My aunt and uncle retired there, and we visited a few times, but I don't get the allure. It's hot, buggy, full of malls and traffic, and politically foreign to me. How horrible to think you are making a savvy decision and discover you have trapped yourself in a place you cannot leave. After my uncle died, my aunt couldn't wait to sell the house and move. In two months she had said goodbye forever to Florida and moved to Colorado Springs, where her sisters brother-in-law and niece and nephew lived. People are more important than place or bargains. I've never forgotten that lesson. And if my friend moved back, it would be to a small condo somewhere, as she could never buy back into her neighborhood or with a house as nice as the one she had. I sure wish them well, and hope someone buys their house, but it's literally been years, and no one has been interested. It's a nice house with pool and dock. But it is where a hurricane destroyed a lot of property, and no one dares to be there any more. It has not come back.
I see my friend when she visits her daughter, so I'll see her next year, no doubt. But I wish I could help her out of this mess, and I cannot. I pray she has a lucky year next year.
No comments:
Post a Comment