It's March! The 49th Anniversary Of My Parents Move To Florida

My parents Nelson and Mary and I visited my Uncle Bill (my mother's brother) and Aunt Elsie in Stuart, Florida back in April of 1975, where they had bought a condo at the Monterey Yacht and Country Club a few years earlier. My Uncle Bill and Aunt Elsie gave us the grand tour, taking us to see the House of Refuge, an historic rescue station built in 1875, a Jai-Alai match in Fort Pierce, and a visit to Stuart Beach. And my father was able to play golf once again with my Uncle Bill, which they used to do every year for two weeks when our families went up to Ontario on vacation. We even took a cruise on the St. Lucie River, where we got stuck on a sandbar and had to wait hours for the company's other boat to rescue us. I remember they dropped the price of beer to 5 cents, and my Uncle Bill spent his time singing along to the old tunes played by the piano player. It was well past dark by the time we got back to shore. And by the way, it gets very chilly out there on the water in April.  The following year, in March of 1976, my parents moved from Chicago to the same complex, but on the river side, instead of along the golf course, where Uncle Bill and Aunt Elsie lived. The photograph on the left is of my parents posing in front of their new condo right after they moved in. 

Both my mother and father loved it there, and after my father passed away, my mother continued to live there, telling me she made more friends there than any other place she had ever lived. And so, the condo has now been in our family for 49 years. My sister Susan and I took the condo back from our renters last June, and plan to stay there half the year. And I am happy to report that the place pretty much looks the same as it did years ago. Why ruin that classic 1970s look with a remodeling? Stuart, by the way, is still a great place to live. There are a lot more people living here now, along with a lot more traffic, of course, but these days Stuart is a much more diversified and interesting place, with a beautiful historic downtown. Just watch your step if you decide to take a cruise on the river.