Tile Installation, 1937, WPA “New Deal” Art,  Coral Way Elementary School in Miami. Our school growing up, our father’s before us, and the place where his mother ran her 5th Grade classroom for over 20 years. All the subject of a future post.

Man's true history cannot be written until he knows the self that is beyond time. Then he can write his history, and then he can know his beginning. Then he can know it is not a line, but a circle, ever evolving, ever moving, like infinity. No beginning and no end to it-- that's the history of Man going on and on recreating itself over and over again.

-- Lambertus Ekkart, Love of the Known

Listen: Billy Pilgrim has come unstuck in time.

-- Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse Five

Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.

--  Reiner Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

The Florida Dream, Bound for Glory.

Your friendly host, at Bear Cut, Key Biscayne, perched precariously out in a mangrove tree doing his best to keep his canvas (below) from becoming a kite without string.

Photo: Chuck Fadely, The Miami Herald

Biscayne Morning P. Crockett

HERE follows one man's chronicles of a most unusual adventure, and I can only hope that by some means unknown it might make safe passage into your good hands. I would gladly provide you with my coordinates, if I could, but that is most unfortunately impossible. Where I now sit writing is not a place subject to pinpointing upon a map. Neither does it appear governed by, or even the least bit interested in, any part of the web of Logic, Law, Divine Justification, etc., found so useful by Man in the exercise of his unfettered lust for control and domination, for Power and for wealth, across the span of centuries.

Moonlight on Biscayne Bay, 1904

It has been weeks now, you see, since I first set forth upon my venture into the depths of the Great Florida Dream! As you might imagine, it has been a most remarkable journey. I appear to have "taken the plunge" into one of the most truly singular of Dreams held close in the Human heart, one of its most enduring, generally incomprehensible, and epic living Fables.

I have indeed embarked upon a journey of sorts, and now pause for a moment to write and invite you to join me. Certainly hope you can make it.

Discovery is always much more fun, in the sharing.

SHOULD you choose to come along for the ride, we will cover a lot of ground and yet not really go anywhere, at least in terms of an actual destination. So if there is one single reason I have undertaken the considerable labor of putting together this illustrated exploration of an ongoing journey, it arises simply from my natural desire to share that which I most love. (Although quite honestly, I have grown to realize that only well along the path.)

Key Biscayne Trail    P. Crockett

Early Confederate Flag made in Florida, 1861.

Captain Blood Inspecting the Treasure Dean Cornwell

MORE than anything else, then, this account is a personal celebration, and nothing would give its author greater pleasure than for you to simply enjoy it.

To look at the pictures.

Should you by chance happen to find any of the words or ideas herein worth the keeping, if only for further consideration,

excellent.

Yet if you find here simply a few moments of pleasant diversion, I shall count my endeavor a great success.

Miami as "Playground": a recurring theme for a City in search of its identity.

But in “selling” the promise of its very intimate, personal connections with this particularly flirtatious Siren, the City is far from alone.

From Coral Gables Today, 1926

SO please do enjoy. Oh, and Yes--

allow yourself to just imagine.

It's good for the soul.

The Miami River Rapids, late 1890's, near the location of today's 27th Avenue. People tend to think of Florida as completely flat, but in actuality early surveys measured Lake Okeechobee at a mean of twenty feet above sea level. Over the centuries the river's mighty force had worn its way through the limestone "basin" of the Everglade's edge at the Miami's source.

From here the water came "tumbling out, falling 10 feet within a distance of 300 yards." It was described as a spot of extraordinary beauty. Destroyed by dynamite, early 20th century. Entrance to Everglades, at Miami, 1908.  (Below)

Poinciana (Still Proud) P. Crockett

SO many marvels to consider...

If ever an antique photo might weep for its lack of color, this could be it. Just imagine the scene, above,

when the Earth was so very much younger. 1908, Pictured Knowledge, an illustrated encyclopedia for children.

You’ve got to love a group of adults with the good sense to enjoy the simple pleasure of sitting together up in a tree.

Coconut Grove, 1880’s. The “Hunting Grounds” noted can be seen on the map of the area, 1859, below.

The area would later become the site of Charle’s Deering’s home on the Bay, in the Cutler Ridge/ Palmetto Bay area.

Draining the Everglades Eugene Savage http://www.hamiltonauctiongalleries.com/Eugene-Savage.htm

Seminole, 1904.   We have never really known them at all, and cannot now presume to say different for their current ownership of a Hard Rock Cafe Hotel and Gambling Casino with an actual street address, in Hollywood, Florida.

A “Florida Western,” 1951. Here the Injuns swim murderously beneath the “quicksand” waters, leap like screeching demons from the trees, and God-knows-what-all else.

My friend Jane Reno (Janet’s mother) was of the opinion that the colorful and festive garb now so completely identified with the Seminole was essentially a protective adaptation, facilitated by the timely introduction of the sewing machine, distinguishing theirs from the Black community in the notably hateful and violent Jim Crow South.

I have not counted the number of images presented here, but it's certainly been (easily!) enough to melt my mind!

I have learned a great deal in the course of this journey. Please do not feel rushed, or any need to absorb it all at one sitting. I’m not certain that it may even be comfortably possible to “read” this posting in a sitting. Images, I suppose, call for more attention. (At this particular point, for that matter, I’m not even certain that it will ever be finished! But if you are reading these words, that is a very good sign.)

You might want to allow some time in your life to pause and enjoy them, simply for whatever they are.

Just a little "dreaming" time.

Ocean Drive, Miami Beach 1912

From Coral Gables: A Perfect City 19261

THEY have no other plans and should be around, if you feel like coming back for another visit. Any time of the day or night, really, is completely all right with them.

In fact, images love being appreciated, really seen, ideally being remembered in a good way. It feels to them even an important part of what they are here for; appreciation helps keep them proud and alive. Otherwise colors will start to fade, lines grow indistinct. Just a little, at first.

Please, drop on by whenever the idea might occur to you. You will find this a wonderful, private place to relax and just breathe.

It’s always cool in the shade here, and quiet. The sound of the fountain is like music.

You are always welcome.

And so it has been always, yet the vast bulk of images from the greater span of history no longer exist, even in memory.

Above and below from Wreckers of the Florida Keys, Harper's Magazine, 1911

A picture is worth a thousand words, easily, and sometimes more than any number. Maybe 100 images carefully collected and joined together as part of one chronicle tell a thousand stories.

If I asked "What is the Florida dream, to you?," and you stopped to think about it, you would probably see: pictures.

"Winter Visitors to Cocoanut Grove, 1886-87"

THAT is also the way that we dream.

1953. Filmed at the famed Cypress Gardens.

And, how we remember. (Although smell and music seem also to share that quality of putting us right on that train back to memory, leaving logic or rational thought distantly behind at the station, scratching its head.)

It is a profound question that knows no bottom, the power of the image. They soothe and delight us, they horrify and deeply disturb us, they inspire or manipulate us.

Sometimes images have a power all their own, and sometimes the message is in the juxtaposition. Here is one of the numerous photographs from Florida’s history evidencing man’s wanton treatment of the environment, and especially the other animals. I count this image within that category only because the Whip Ray has never been considered edible in the Western Hemisphere. So it has been killed for sport, for cheap thrills, or for no reason at all.

Is it not a beautiful creature?

Almost as soon as I saw it, another image flashed into my mind. Maybe that is why images are so powerful a thing. Like music (for example, “cheesy” but catchy advertising jingles), they require no formal invitation to take up residence in your head. Once something has been seen, it cannot be unseen, even if (perhaps especially if) you really wish that it could.

Without further commentary, here is the other image:

IT occurs to me that the great philosopher Plato dismissed the image (paintings, in his days), as a mere “shadow of a shadow.” Yet his quest was different than ours, and since his days, or even within the last 20 years, the world has undergone a sea change. We live out our lives in an abounding and limitless world of images (made possible, for example, by the Internet and the computer you now sit pondering) far beyond the imagination of even that most brilliant of men.

To him, the “idea of a tree” was under no circumstances to be mistaken for the tree itself.  We understand that, I believe, and have gone one step further.

It is indeed true that, say, a photograph of a Polar bear running along with two of its cubs is not to be mistaken for the animals themselves. Yet therein lies its very power—in the idea itself. We know that if we put the photo to our noses, we will smell no scent of bear. And its surface is smooth to the touch, not wooly and frosted with ice.

And yet if the animal is to be saved—if such redemption remains possible—it will be the image much more than the bear itself that makes it happen. Part of us knows that if we do not apply our attention to its plight, and quickly, the image will be all that we have left. And that, for only so long as we might have left.

We have already lost so much; the thought is unbearable.

Above: An Edwardian-era case display of preserved passenger pigeons, once probably the most numerous bird on the planet, Its habitat the huge and unbroken unbroken primary forest covering North America east of the Rocky Mountains, flocks a mile wide and 300 miles long were so dense that they darkened the sky for hours and days as they passed overhead. Its population was estimated to approach 4 billion in the 18th century, about 40% of the total number of birds then in North America.

John James Audubon, American Passenger Pigeon

No more. This may be the only species for which the exact time of extinction is known: Martha, the heartbroken last of her species, dies at the Cincinattii Zoo on September 1, 1914.  R.I.P.,

The photograph may remain,  but the world it documents will itself have been diminished. The Mama and baby bears scampering along on the ice, the bears in the picture, and any descendants that might have followed them, will no longer leave paw prints upon the ice. The subtext of the image will be transformed from excitement and majesty to sorrow.

Even the little guy in the box of animal crackers would remind us. He never seemed lonely before despite his lack of a mate, but then again, we knew that they were out there.

Stereopticon, Polar Bear Family with Seal, Chicago Museum of Natural History

And our children’s children will have to explain to theirs, “No, that’s not make-believe. There really were bears that were all white, once. The snow and the ice were their home. They were fierce on land, but you should’ve seen how they could dive and swim.”

“Yes, they were beautiful. They really were.”

WITH images, as with our attention and perception, the power is all in the editing. When used as a medium for genuine communication, the power of the image is without parallel. Words are clunky in comparison, able to carry only a fraction of the “freight” of meaning as might an image, and in the process tending to invite further misunderstanding and greater divisiveness.

There is a quality of the Human heart that will continue turn intuitively to an image, with a sense of Hope, when all words have become forever frozen in a hard, thick layer of mistrust. Words are hard and sharp, and can be seen coming a mile away. In contrast, people only rarely approach an image anticipating any kind of attack.  Thus the raw power of propaganda.

The most direct means of approach to the deeper tale always unfolding in the Florida Dream, in all of its breathtaking audacity and brazen shamelessness, it seems to me….

The steady march to the drum-beat of Progress: from Technicolor (above), 1941, to MiamiColor! below, 1967.

…is in the bounty of images it has always seemed to generate.

It must surely rank among the most documented of Great Dreams. That’s not the problem; this is not that kind of puzzle.

Florida Dreams of Itself

Below: Alligator Released to custody of town taxidermist.

Note in the background what must be one of Florida’s “shell stores.”

Florida has always seemed, and in fact been, a sort of perpetual frontier. A last frontier, always.

WITH this Dream, the real challenge is in trying to figure out what in the devil is going on. Or for that matter, even beginning to make heads or tails out of any of it!

Of course, it’s worth noting that a Dream is specifically not a Puzzle.

Then again, I suppose I must grant that it might be!

If one is to venture any real depth into the Florida dream, the sole requirement might seem an open mind. Not as easy as it sounds; in our “branded” culture of commodity, where absolute conformity is pursued as a relentless ideal, it’s no wonder that people presume to know today, exactly where they are to be, tomorrow.

It’s a shabby and unfortunate business indeed when travelers keep themselves mentally occupied solely by proving to themselves (or imposing upon others) whatever notions or beliefs they might have brought with them in the first place.

In such cases, when agenda replaces awareness, it is not difficult to miss completely how very wide and open is the horizon surrounding us on all sides, and the skies above!

Everglades, 1880's

Do I contradict myself? Very well, then I contradict myself, I am large, I contain multitudes.

—Walt Whitman

THE Dream itself is not to be found on any map. It requires no place, for it is woven of many. Dreams are more like stars than planets, and closer to galaxies than stars, because they are vast, and are larger than all of it, yet somehow at the same time themselves interwoven into a grand tapestry.

Even a young child can point out the distinctive outlines of the State on a map (usually the one embellished with the alligators, oranges, and/or bikini-clad beach babes under the umbrellas), and even touch the map with her little fingers, but will only shrug when asked about the location of the Dream.

Scientific Map of Miami, 1933

Yet something calls out out to us from this distant realm. Though it be far beyond our ken, it promises something that will complete us. Those fortunate enough to have somehow found their way there and to taste of it, have returned home bearing some knowledge that matters.

They come back enriched by a new understanding, that might yield a single golden fruit: Hope.

It is the only harvest of its kind, and quite miraculous: simply dreaming of it, awaiting with whatever patience one might muster the hour of its glorious arrival, brings it forth. One small seed, held in the palm of your hand, is as golden and valuable as the entire crop of any great grove.

(And may there come a day, and soon, when the people remember that when one of us is lifted, it does not pull any of us down, or hurt the rest of us. But when any of us fall, we are all diminished.

We tend to get that one backwards. And many more of us are falling, than rising.)

Maybe we can try compassion. We seem so ready to punish.

I am quite certain that the best place to practice compassion, ounce for ounce, is also its (far and away) most difficult, elusive and somehow distant target: ourselves.

The face looking back at yours, curiously, in the mirror.

SOME journeys are not for measuring in miles. As apparently suits its purposes, the path on which this journey has led me remains completely unbound by time, distance, or even reason. The way has been anything but linear, in fact, with neither map nor compass of any real use, and only instinct and intuition to guide. In this realm, I am not experienced.

Or maybe I am. I once wrote in my journal, in which I made note of my dreams, “By noon, the dream is forgotten.”

One of the early “Motion Picture Novels” of the Everglades.

Paradox thrives in its heady atmosphere as does, say sawgrass in its Everglades home. It is everywhere!

Words are useful only to a degree in presuming to report upon a Mystery more infinite and vast by far than their architecture was ever intended to sustain.

Rescue Winslow Homer

Crop, 1900’s

Miami leaves even the most beloved dreams of yesterday behind. It is only a matter of time before all evidence has been destroyed.

Henry Flagler’s Royal Palm Hotel

“Tropical Wonderland”

Biscayne Night P. Crockett

I HAVE undertaken research of a scope and depth of intensity that can only bespeak true passion (You know how it’s so easy to learn everything you can about the things you really love?), as if something of the utmost importance depended upon it.

I have labored with the intensity of an archivist handed the finest and most very precious volumes of Knowledge, inscribed in disappearing ink.

The rarest of the rare: the breed of visionary who can not only see the whimsical elegance of the Venetian Pool where others see only a sharp-edged, gaping rock pit, but can then proceed to bring his vision into being, for all to see and enjoy and experience. We all owe him. George Edgar Merrick, Founder of Coral Gables.

Miami as Venetian Dream (Above & Below)

Advertisement in Miami Senior High School Year Book, 1922

Advertisement for “the City Beautiful,” 1926

Never without a good fight!

Road to Cocoanut Grove. Below, interestingly, Drive to Cocoanut Grove.

Vizcaya

And yet it hasn't really felt like work, at all.

I have gathered countless images of Florida and its history, and photographs and documents spanning several generations of my family. I have interviewed older family members, uncovered contemporary chronicles, and voraciously consumed historical accounts.

The Dade County Courthouse, Rising Over the Old Courthouse 1920’s

I have hit countless dead-ends, yet found also unexpected portals where I might have expected only a hard, flat brick wall.

I have at last given up on the completion of certain puzzles, only to see them (almost as if by happenstance) come together with pieces fallen from one completely different.

Much to my surprise: more like watching petals fall softly upon the grass, presumably from some flower above, than taking to the hot forge again with hammer and anvil, determined to make it fit.

Spanish Moss John Singer Sargent

Garden Oasis       P. Crockett

AND so, as I embark upon what I have come to recognize at last as a journey of the Heart, I move forward with a singular hope and intention.

As I move freely in and out of the Magical, and dive beneath that river well known to us to swim deep and free within the currents more ancient and vast running always just beneath,

from Wreckers of the Florida Keys, Harper's Magazine, 1911

as I venture further into a realm of pure possibility unbound by time, distance, or even reason,

I cast my strongest hope in somehow touching that chord within your Heart that knows and understands, even if we both might have in part forgotten.

Afternoon Tea, Peacock Inn 1887

WHO knows when a tiny spark of recognition might take flight and burst into a living golden flame that warms and

lights at last an inner hearth long grown a little cold, and dark?

There is something great and good that we share, though you might well know it by any other name. It is the heart of your Home and the Home of your Heart, and you can seek out its exact center by taking the time to stop for a moment, and to feel where your love is.

Sailboats, Cocoanut Grove, 1880's

You see, the truly wondrous thing about this Great Dream in which I find myself awakening is, that I am not alone in it, and neither is it my Dream alone. And neither is it foreign to you, not in the least.

It is undeniably so that any exploration of a land that contains oranges and alligators, sawgrass and key lime pie, lurid flamingos and chocolate-covered coconut patties that outlast Human lives, by its very nature, cannot omit whimsy. I mean, come on, consider the sunsets!

Carmen Miranda (The Morning After) P. Crockett

Deco Dreams 1989 Marty Kreloff http://martinkreloff.com//

Poster art for the annual art deco event hosted by the Miami Design Preservation League, bringing to mind an era that now seems long, long ago and far, far away. Marty is a friend of mine. Although his notable art career has led him to L.A. for the past several years now, he will always carry Florida with him, in his heart and on his palette. Cannot help it.

Bathers

He has absolutely no idea of it, but Marty played an important role in my own artistic journey. Back in 1990,

I brought to this real, established professional artist, a bit nervously, only the fourth or fifth painting I'd ever done for critique:

Scott and Daviea P Crockett

He said,"Keep it up." At that time and in that place, he made a positive difference in my life. Thank you, Marty.

YET neither is our journey together any indulgence in pure whimsy, or entirely fanciful. We are here at the same time in our respective places, and you are now reading these words, for a reason.

And we need not know exactly what it is, perhaps are not meant to, or it will not serve us. But is it not in our nature to inquire?

Night Garden P. Crockett

Imagine. Your train will either pull into the station waiting, or disappear forever.

It remains fully mysterious, and yet this I know. It is not only welcoming of all, it partakes of all, as the sun and silver moon shine their light upon all equally, without regard to qualification or virtue.

It might be seen as something larger than any of us but leaving out not one of us. We are all of us part of it, and are as a matter of common course blessed and enriched by the works and vision of those we will never know, or might choose to have nothing to do with, if we did.

It is as an ocean, that refuses no rivers.

Hunting Eugene Savage

NONE may lay claim to it with any flag, though mighty kingdoms have certainly tried, and neither can its geography be reduced to points upon a one-dimensional map. We all are home together there, perhaps held too close to see within its warm embrace.

The heart even now beating within your breast, together with all of your hopes, fears, and dreams large and small, is an indispensable part of it. Its very heart beats along with yours, and mine.

And words fade away at last to Light! having served their purpose and fulfilled their commission.

Along the Way P. Crockett

THE animals can hear it better and more clearly than we. And in their very being, despite everything, they pray it.

How could we possibly imagine any real Florida dream without them?

Benjamin Disraeli famously observed that there are three kinds of lies: “lies, damned lies, and statistics.” This is a damned lie, and bizarre, to boot. The event “reported” never happened, and neither was anything like it at all likely. Florida Panthers are among the most diminutive of the “big cats,” and are by temperament shy and reclusive. Possibly a Victorian-era morality tale, teaching that perhaps it is better to stick with “the beast that you know”—and require no “pursuit for a kiss,” than to take your chances in the greater “jungle out there” of the World. Only one possible interpretation, of many. Whatever the intended lesson, however, it had absolutely no proper business involving the innocent panther.

Any such fine points as to “subtext” were lost completely on Florida’s settlers, who learned to shoot to kill, on sight.

Panther Cubs

“First fox caught in South Florida.” I wonder if any remain.

“Gathering Turtle Eggs, Florida”

Popular Mechanics Magazine, 1928 .

The ancient, magnificent sea turtles never really had a chance, being both slow and cumbersome on land, and delicious.

IT really cannot all be put into words. Count me a fool for even trying. And yet,

none have ever heard even a minor strain of this Great Song without

breaking down in tears, for the sheer joy of it.

The Artist's Home at Night P. Crockett

“The Deering Estate,” Villa Vizcaya

Welcome to the Peacock Inn P. Crockett

The story of this painting has been told on this web log, at

http://www.growingintothemystery.com/2008/08/capturing-history-before-its-gone.html

Love Never Dies, II P. Crockett

The Lay of the Land: the Mysterious Everglades

I. The Great Question

The natural lay of the land. South Florida, 1859.

WELL beneath the abundance of colorful images and the frothy profusion of stereotypes that we tend to immediately recognize and appreciate as facets of the Great Florida Dream, there has always run an ancient and solemn sense of mystery. It might be understood as Florida’s “shadow” or “dark side,” balancing out the bright and garish color we usually associate with the State. (What other place yields a fruit named for a color?)

In this case, the “dark side” connotes no sense of evil, nothing necessarily sinister at all. Closer to, for example, the dark side of the Moon. It is very much like the side we know, but simply not illuminated. We might not know exactly what it is (thus its mystery), but it is not frivolous. There is real power in it, beyond even our ability to measure, or even perceive.

It seems suitable that underground rivers and even “seas” (or aquifers) run beneath the ground that we walk upon, for we do not know precisely the routes they follow, what their source, or where the mighty dark rivers might be bound if left alone to nature.

It makes the mystery no less because we turn on the shower or the sink and that very water pours out, though we might then tend to think about it no more.

In a Florida Jungle Winslow Homer

If one had to pinpoint the very center of that deeper “mystery within the Mystery” at the core of Florida’s being, it would have to be the Everglades. Some might be delighted by and drawn to it and others repulsed, but in either case the “gathering” of the magic in the place, the intimation of deeper and more ancient rhythms, is undeniable.

IN the course of doing some exploring for this posting, I came across an extraordinary article published in a 1904 issue of Century Illustrated Magazine.

I wanted to share with you these parts of it:

“Not only the name fascinates, but the mystery. Here is a vast region close to inquisitive pioneer life, bordered by lines of commerce and fashionable travel, and yet as unplotted and almost as unvisited as the darkest Africa of our school-day atlases. A few hundred Indians share its hidden life, thread its silent water-paths, and are at home in the heart of it; but the white man does not follow. They disappear from his sight as into another planet, and he stands upon the brink gazing curiously after them.

What is out there under the sunset?

There is undoubtedly agricultural value in the rich depositof mud and muck at the bottom of this wide-stretching inland lagoon; and if the water could be withdrawn, the battle with the grass would become comparatively simple. Hence all the projects that have had to do with the taming or reclaiming of the Everglades have been based on the draining of them. … in fact, the enormous task is being boldly attempted. The fortress will be taken by siege, not by assault.

Meanwhile, there are other points of view than the practical. The mystery of the Glades creates a fascination.

What is out there, just beyond our ken, under the warm evening sky?

The mystery is a part of our national inheritance. In our earliest geography lessons we were told of this great, trackless water-wilderness. It captivated our fancy once and for all. It has its place among the country's native wonders, like the Mammoth Cave and Niagara Falls, the Yellowstone and Yosemite and the Grand Canon of the Colorado, the Great Natural Bridge of Virginia and the newly discovered greater natural bridges of Utah. After all, it is rather a good thing to have a little of Wonderland left. If this semi- tropical portion of it is not yet surveyed and plotted and drained and homesteaded, there are compensations.

We shall all feel a secret regret when the North Pole is reached. There is a compelling charm in the unknown. In the Glades that charm is still potent. There are boats in the Mammoth Cave, Niagara has been measured and harnessed, and there are national routes into the national parks and railroad trains to the Canon; but the Everglades, taken as a whole, are still marked on the latest maps " Unexplored."

II. PAUL’S QUESTION

Q: Is it true that the eastern edge of the Everglades once ran along the line now marked by 27th Avenue?

A: Yes. Now stop bugging me, already!

I had heard that in its natural state, only a little over one hundred years ago, the above was the case. Only ten blocks west of my home. I found that difficult to comprehend. "Wait a minute," I thought, "my friends Eric and Katy live down in Homestead, and they're the ones who live near the Everglades. From where I live, it's a haul."

Yet as I will show you visually the statement is true; that is where the boundary lay. Upon further thought I realized that part of my difficulty in really getting that idea was that I had come to regard 27th Avenue as considerably more real, or solid, than the abstract idea of the Everglades. When I paid careful attention to my thinking, “Wow, it came right up to 27th Avenue,” I got a kick out of it. I was thinking as if as if two immovable forces of nature had collided, and perhaps been surprised to meet one another.

Biscayne Holiday Eugene Savage

In my experience, the avenue has always been there, indeed something of a landmark if nothing to write home about (but then again, I am home) and as reliable as the North Star in my navigation. The Everglades, on the other hand, remained somewhere else.

Thinking back on it, I recall the family drive down to the Everglades National Park in my childhood as a fairly epic journey, distance-wise, with little to show for it. There were no geysers on the hour, performing animals, or thrilling sharks. There was sawgrass; I remember that.

As I recall, a park ranger might have pointed toward this infinite field of green and talked about the natural habitat of the alligators. "That's cool," I thought, suddenly paying keen attention and hoping to glimpse a sudden blur of reptilian motion, ideally hear an ear-piercing, dramatic and extended, rattling and gurgling death cry, and then see blood gushing. Lots of it!

But nothing happened. He just kept droning on, as if he might have been trying to talk himself to sleep, and the grass shimmering in the waves of summer heat began to blur in my vision.

IN retrospect, as a child I had no real way of putting into perspective where that “park” stood, what it might mean--, in relationship to, say, the "other jungles," Monkey Jungle or Parrot Jungle, where at least they had either cool or garish animals (or both), or for that matter Pirate’s World up in Dania, which had not only actual rides but also ice cream, and was therefore of clear and paramount importance in the natural order of things.

Map to Parrot Jungle. Few dared venture in without it.

And I definitely saw more animals at the Lion Country Safari attraction, although looking back they might well have been sedated. Can’t really say that I blame them.

Oh, well…

Paul takes his B & W Polaroid to Lion Country Safari, early ‘60’s.

Now, getting back to the question. I came upon evidence! This shot, taken in 1911, depicts the 27th Avenue bridge crossing over the Miami River.

Since that road runs North/ South, we now look westward past that landmark:

Since I know where the bridge is, having traversed it countless times, I have a “link” to meaning. Nothing else in the image is even vaguely recognizable, except for the river itself, sort of.

Of course, I had to add a little color to the situation. I just do these things; don’t ask me why.

Upon reflection, I realized that the photograph was not at all what I'd first taken it to be. In the same sense that color postcards once proudly illustrated the exciting new factories belching forth their formidable funnels of black smoke into a wide blue sky, here was an image of progress!

The first words of its title are "Drainage Canal,” and this is no nature shot. It is to be filed under "technology/ progress,” with the Glades along for the ride only as its hapless victim. The massive engineering project of "reclamation" is now underway, once and for all addressing the "problem" posed to agriculture, "progress," etc., by all that damned water flowing willy-nilly in the Great River of Grass.

Since the Everglades is in essence a great river flowing South, these canals running East/ West bisecting its path are much like a stake to the heart of a vampire, intended to disrupt and destroy its ancient patterns so that man can finally take matters in hand and proceed with the “taming” of this uncontrollable and thus offensive , and ultimately impermissible place.

ALL of which (somehow!) leads us back to where we now stand. To put things into some meaningless perspective, let's look at the same site today.

Click on the photo to enlarge: the Red "A" marks the site of the bridge.

(Don't Blame it on Google.)

Or, here is the same view from the ground, courtesy of that ultimate voyeur, Google Earth. ("Hey, is that your car passing by?)

You can even catch a glimpse of the same stretch of river, at least a bit of it.

Just to end this study on a more positive, if completely imaginary note, I was moved to rewrite history through Photoshop, if only on my computer and if only for a moment.

But doesn’t the Earth look happier? I know I would be.

Just food for thought… Hmmm, 32nd Avenue and Flagler St.

SO, anybody else out there also about ready to keep it movin’ on? Give me just a sec to pull out our magic map and see where we're bound next.

All right. Let’s see here. Hmmm.

What? You’d like to see the map?

Are you ready for this? Sure you can handle it?

OK then... Here it is.

Would never have considered leaving home without it.

Paul's working map, within the Florida Dream

MOVING right along, then.

I see, YES! The map is giving me a great idea! (I'm sure that each of you had independently discerned this yourselves.)

BEING as how we are exploring the realm of dream, with all doors of possibility flung wide open,

and something keeps pulling me back towards that pristine, crystal clear Miami River,

Let’s do a little...

“THREE or four miles above Cocoa-nut Grove is Miami, the oldest "town" on the bay, numbering not more than half a dozen houses. As Miami is located at the mouth of the river of the same name, which flows directly from the Everglades, it is the chief Indian trading-post on the bay, the store being located on the south bank, at Brickell's landing.

Brickell's Trading Post, View from bay, and aerial (below).

Just across the river is all that remains of the old Fort Dallas,

which holds a conspicuous place in the history of the Seminole wars. It is now the residence of Mrs. Tuttle, a Northern lady of culture and indomitable energy, who is doing a great deal for this section of Florida.

JULIA STURTEVANT TUTTLE of Cleveland, Ohio, among the first of many Ohioans to relocate in Miami. She and her husband had traveled to the area in 1875 to visit her father, who held 40 acres there, including orange groves along the bay's shore. She was charmed by the area, but dutifully returned to Ohio’s winter. She was widowed in 1886, and kept successfully in operation the iron foundry that had been the family business. Five years later her father died, willing to her his land.

She proceeded forthwith to sell the family business and move to Miami, using the proceeds to purchase 640 acres of (what is now considered) prime real estate, including the Northern shore of the Miami River on the Bay and much of what is today's downtown. She became an important neighbor to the Brickell family, owners of substantial acreage on the south side of the river. Their home and trading post sat on the bayfront point opposite hers.

Having decided that what this backwater cow-town needed was a railroad heading in its direction, she began working on Henry Flagler in 1893, and was twice rebuffed. A hard freeze (the year following our imaginary visit) that devastated most of the State’s citrus and agricultural crop but spared Miami, along with substantial gifts to him of her land, induced him to decide that year that the railroad would be coming.

She died unexpectedly young, at the age of 50, and was among the first interred at the then-new Miami City Cemetery. People loved her, and not only for her central role in the birth of a city. She will be forever remembered, to the extent this city has any memory at all, as "the Mother of Miami." She was that most unusual and dynamic of combinations: a visionary in the extreme yet utterly practical, endowed with natural “people skills,” unencumbered by doubt and strategic in her approach. And, perhaps beyond all of these things, stubborn as a cypress stump.

The Tuttle Home

“I was a guest for several days at Fort Dallas, which, under her touch has been transformed into a little tropic paradise... To Mrs. Tuttle I was indebted for boat and guide for my trip into that wonderland, the Everglades.

The Miami River is one of the principal outlets from the glades on the east coast, and though a sluggish stream at its mouth, it tumbles over the coral rock near its source in splendid rapids against which a boat is dragged, not rowed, with difficulty.

WE entered the glades by the north fork of the Miami, as beautiful a stream as ever flowed through an unbroken wilderness,

the trees in places almost arching the water, its banks clothed with strange vegetation and stranger flowers, the bottom presenting a kaleidoscopic picture of many-colored grasses and aquatic vegetation.

The guide told of festoons of moccasin-snakes sunning themselves amid the branches of these trees in former times, and of prowling beasts in the bush, but we saw nothing to make us afraid.

WHEN the boat had been dragged over the point where the water makes its first plunge, at the head of the rapids, and we were rowing again in smooth water, what a surprise was in store for us!

I had always associated with the term "Everglades," on the map of Florida, the picture of a low-lying, dank, dark, malarial swamp, the abode of venomous creeping things ; a morass where the rank vegetation luxuriating in decay formed shadowy dells, on entering which one might well leave hope behind.

BUT instead I found an inland lake, of drinkable water, lying high up in the sunshine,

while stretching away toward sunset as far as eye could reach was only a vision of blue waters, green isles, and vast areas of sedge-grass or reeds, moving in the balmy breeze like ocean billows.

This is the picture of the Everglades in winter; in summer it might be something very different."

-- Charles Richard Dodge, Subtropical Florida, Scribner’s Magazine, 18

94

FOLLOWING the river back to the present (upstream, of course) seems as likely and logical a means of return as any, assuming that we must come back.

1918

By now, the once-pristine river had already been largely “broken” to man’s service. The first blow was the hardest, a two-fisted punch perhaps itself enough to effectively destroy the River’s health: the demolition of its rapids in the early 1900’s and the accompanying “Reclamation Project,” its specific ambition to disrupt as completely as possible the natural flow of its source.

But another blow was to follow quite shortly: the evacuation of all raw waste and sewage from Flagler’s Royal Palm Hotel directly into its waters. My father, born in Miami in 1930, remembers the River as always having been “disgusting.”

1929

Now as well-established as the city itself, an invaluable resource for commerce. Long since, a quintessentially urban, working river.

1935

The Nation is locked in a Great Depression. Who cares about the River?

AS long as we insist on continuing to probe with words this Great Mystery, it occurred to me to share a poem written in the spirit of the moment (in an email, actually) in 2006 for my friend Jerry Anderson.

Jerry is an Episcopal priest who for decades was called to one of the most challenging of missions I can imagine-- a very "hands on" ministry for people suffering the ravages of AIDS and for their shell-shocked loved ones. For so many years it was all a pure horror-show, with the truly tragic the stuff of a "day at the office," and happy endings rare.

In the early years, people suffered greatly and finally died. Had Jerry not undertaken this work at the time that he did-- through ministries he himself had to create-- many of these people would have died unattended by a caring spiritual counselor, and many more died alone.

He arrived as a blessing.

I took this picture to send to Max in 2003 (So no, this is not a casual shot of Jerry holding art and pondering rock!), and called it the "the Sacred Among the Sacred." Jerry is in my back yard, where a lush garden now thrives, holding Max's painting Guinea Pig, a reference to St. Sebastian honoring the countless people with AIDS who continued to volunteer for clinical trials even when they had given up hope for themselves. He is kneeling by the coral formation just in front of the Cottage, then only recently excavated.

Something came through in this letter, I suppose out of sheer necessity, because it was such an intense and truly awful time. A mutual friend dear to us both, Wesley Maxwell ("Max") Lawton, was at last about to die.

Max 4/27/56 – 9/16/06

Back Home with the Angels.

Max was a truly great soul and a wonderful artist. A true original, rare indeed, with a huge heart. Also a formidable warrior for those causes in which he had enlisted, willing to stand down to none if forbidden by his mission. We loved him very much.

He had met Jerry in 1992, the year he was diagnosed with advanced AIDS and effectively written off for dead. He was actually advised by his treating physicians to prepare for his demise, but Max apparently had other ideas on the subject. Strong ones, which I have little doubt he made abundantly clear.

Although they shrugged their shoulders and called it "denial"when he made it clear that he had no intention of dying, thank you very much—and that he wanted a chaplain to help him pray to live rather than to help him prepare for death, he insisted. That is how he first met Jerry.

Here is one of his paintings, perhaps his masterpiece, Man of Sorrows: Christ with AIDS. Despite his very personal, even private relationship with the piece, it became the subject of considerable international notoriety and appreciation after he was invited by Archbishop Desmond Tutu to the Cathedral in Cape Town, South Africa to paint a version for installation there.

Some words written by the artist follow.

"In the Advent season of 1993, I was alone in my apartment and was overcome with grief from the loss of almost all my friends, loved ones and mentors to AIDS. I felt like no one knew me anymore. A strange thing happened as I cried, I had a waking dream, like a vision.

I say myself sitting on a hospital examination table, naked, and hooked up to oxygen and IV drips. Suddenly, the image changed. It was no longer me sitting there, but Christ covered in AIDS cancer lesions with his head bowed, nude, wearing only a crown of thorns.

I knew I had to paint it. I quickly gathered my supplies and, in a transcendent experience, I made the first version of “Man of Sorrows: Christ with AIDS."

I had questions that needed to be answered. As I painted Christ I was reminded of the many versions of “Man of Sorrows" referred to in Isaiah 53, 3-4, from the 16th century and of Gruenewald’s Christ as a plague victim. This gave me the merit to continue.

I also knew I had to answer the fundamentalists who were saying AIDS was God's judgment on gay people and drug users. In the painting I also quoted Jesus' words from Matthew 25 that when you offer care giving “to the least of these, my brethren, you are doing it unto me." I intertwined the words with the image.

Afterwards, I knew something inside me changed. I realized God knows my pain and shares my grief. I was healed of a lot of hurt. God still knew me."

-- Wesley Maxwell Lawton

WITH that backdrop, I give you this letter.

Oh, Dear Jerry :

How fearlessly you continue to rush into the eternal flame,
Time and time, again;

Lest anyone be left alone within it
Left alone to feel the slow lick of the flames
Or perchance to see coming, helpless, the freight-train plume heading dead-on
Toward impact, like a comet
inevitable and unimaginable
(Evaporating without a trace even the outlines of the life that had been)

Left alone to watch their lovers die

Such an hour of exquisite agony,
The birth pangs of another death
A moment of pure power

When one suddenly bereft stands weakly

Blinded suddenly
by a thick curtain of darkness descended
(Or perhaps light too brilliant for mortal eye?)

Many a time I have thought back
Upon the death of my Love,
And come to realize, slow and certain as a coming dawn,

It was a good death

But even now, the comforting margin of a decade
Safely under my belt,
The raw horror having yielded into something more gentle, and no longer fresh,
I can never forget how ALONE I felt in those moments

(For I felt, I knew, that there must be something anything I could do
to keep him from falling,
To keep him safe with me in our bed,
Where he belonged, damn it!
Some way to grab hold, some how, to keep him from sliding off that unseen edge
to drop so very far
He couldn't even really be seen

Not seen at all )

So what I want to tell you late this evening, my friend,
Having read your e-mail from the heart about our Max,
Is how very grateful I am
for the gift that you are

Now, as way back when this disease first began its long, slow burn
Underneath our feet

You remain
Simply available to witness,
To love,
And to keep on feeling.

And that gift, my friend,
Is the heart of grace
The presence of mercy

And, the best that any one of us can do
In this whole hurting world.

To love and keep on loving,
As best we can,
No matter what,

Forever.

And yet: even as I ask the unanswerable question:
What kind of Earth is this anymore, really,
Without the Maxwells and Michaels,
The Ronalds and Scotts,
There to brighten our skies, night and day,
To hold us as we fall apart,
Time and again,
and to tell us
There, there. It will be all right
(and, most importantly, mean it)

A little bird begins to take flight within me
The distant flapping of tiny wings
Within and all around,
Like rain

Raising with it this thought:

How very wonderful a place
Heaven must be.

And so through grace,
From a well deeper by far than reason,
I am led to feel that if all shall be well
(And it shall)

Then so it must be also here,
And now.

________________________

Each time my heart breaks anew
Wider open, and more shattered
(When I wouldn't have thought more tiny pieces possible)

I begin to hear
(what is that??)

Music

Even through the tears
Through even the choking numbness

I hear it!

And I feel
Life is great and life is Good,
and in a sense we are here to struggle.
To lose all
(the deeper the fall the greater the Love)
is the lot of the most blessed of us.

I do not really understand,
Nor yet need I

For what I feel, in the music, is

This is Life's great Song,
Singing to itself.

And so I pray,
Crying out (without sound)
In the hardest hour, simply this:

Oh God
Oh God
Break me down or build me up,
But keep me in your palm,
Save me Lift me Leave me draw breath
Fresh and new
And taste its sweetness
Even though it is not to last

Send away the big dark sharks
now encircled everywhere, drawing silently, steathily closer and closer
Nearly feeling the shadowed brush of ancient wet rubber skin against mine,
to taste my final fear

Only a scream away

And yet the dark ocean is so vast,
And safety so far away,
For I am to see the one who meant all to me
Suffer and slip away

And all I can do
Is watch

And scream, out loud or silently inside,
Can't ANYBODY DO anything?

The only miracle I ask is this:
To be opened as from within,
To know:

This is Life's great Song,
Singing to itself

And to know in the heart of my heart
that it is all about love
(the proof is in the pain,
as deep and real as it gets)

And always has been,

And we are each and every one of us
(but perhaps most especially the broken-hearted)
part of it,

Together

Forever.

This is Life's great Song,
Singing to itself

Amen.

I share that poem because I happened to come across it while looking for something else completely, well into the process of writing this post. It hit me like a blessing, because it occurred to me that here was the essence of the Great Florida Dream that I had set out to explore. As poetry can sometimes do, it seemed more true than any other form of words I might be able to cobble together.

I hope that you find something of value in it, to possibly help ease your own way.

THESE are hurtin' times, made more challenging still by the convincing illusion that we each of us walk our paths alone, somehow separate from one another .

We do not, and we are not. Never.

Sometimes the difference between total darkness and one flickering, tiny candle flame seems huge, possibly measurable only in light years.

All I would hope to try and do is to offer up that candle. One small flame. That is my intention. To offer these reminders, that:

IF there has ever been sweet music, promising of harmony and some greater chorus of which we are all a part (and you know that you've heard it),

then it still is now, although we yearn for its sound and listen in vain;

Moonlight Symphony (Miami Summer) P. Crockett

AND, if you have ever experienced the answer to a prayer when you didn’t have a prayer, or ever had that tiny miracle come along in your life exactly when you most needed it to help you through whatever when you would not have had even had a clue what to ask for,

(and you know that it has)

miracles are still possible. Right now.

Bear Cut P. Crockett

THE thing is, to keep Hope alive.

I am just putting these things out there with a positive intention, in a spirit of humility, so that

maybe somebody out there can remind me when I have forgotten.

Because I do forget.

Sunflower Impression P. Crockett

I wanted to sincerely thank you for accompanying me on my unusual journey today, especially if you have actually read it this far! Believe it or not, having you along for the ride has made all of the difference.

I hope you enjoyed it as much as I wish that I had. You will definitely want to be on the train next time, because I have many special treats in store for you not to be found elsewhere, for any price! Please feel free to join my e-mail list, and I’ll be sure to keep you posted along the way, no matter how many twists and turns may be encountered between here and yonder.

At this point, nothing would surprise me!

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