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| The crisp morning light in the living room |
I'm completely smitten with St. Petersburg Florida. In just a few months of owning a property there, I am dying to spend the entire Winter there one day. However, work beckons at home and our life is really in Ontario, so we will continue to plan as many visits as we can over the next few years until we can actually Winter down there. Ontario is beautifully hot in the summer with bright sunny days, but Winter brings extremes. Minus 20 Celsius one day and then 4 degrees and raining the next. And lots of grey skies. I am missing the sunshine spilling gorgeous light into my living room and ever present greenery on the palm trees.
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| The colours pick me up.... |
What I don't miss is the Lawn Guy. We hire a lawn service because we are absent and someone has to maintain control of the jungle (see below). So I hired a guy.(guys actually) Once a week 3 men descend on the garden and we get 15 minute of clipping, mowing, raking etc. For $20.00. A bargain in my eyes. The guy never sends me a bill. I have to try and catch him when we are staying at the house. Last week I sent the Raz Man outside to pay him. Lawn Guy asked Raz Man if he was "the son". Raz Man chuckled and I just about SPIT. Now Raz Man is not a tall man and often people think shorter people are younger people, but GOOD GRIEF. Would he not have to look about 25 to make me look like his mother? Or would I have to look 70 for him to look like my son? To say this threw me is an understatement. I was horrified and immediately retreated to my bathroom to examine my wrinkles, hair style and attire....
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| The Jungle and the now MISSING elephant |
And then I did what any sensible, confident woman of 50 would do. I starting asking everyone how old they thought the Raz Man looked. Followed by how old do they think I look. A very loaded question. A delicate and tricky question that really shouldn't be asked, but I did. And often. Of course the responses were carefully chosen and delicately worded. And the results were obvious. No one dared state I looked older....oh the wrath if they did.
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| The City Beach, St. Petersburg. |
I moved on. To dinner the next evening with some new Floridian friends and work colleagues of the Raz Man. The Wife commented that she liked my new hair style. Now I haven't changed my hair in 5 years. Wild, messy, blonde....the Bed Head look. Easy as pie and I am maintaining this for life. Despite insisting my hair had not changed she insisted it had, and stated it made me look "MUCH YOUNGER" than I did the last time she met me. So of course the 50 year old woman brain starts thinking...."how old did I look last time?" "how old does she think I look?" It doesn't stop...a woman's brain with a seed of doubt.....
I once called a woman the mother when I worked in a retail shop. She was the wife and she walked out and the shop lost a HUGE sale. Have you ever mistaken someone's age. Or had your's mistaken. Plus or minus.?
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| Snell Isle |
The best thing about St. Petersburg is the architecture. House from the late 1800's and gorgeous mid Century homes, cottages, Spanish Villas. A walk along Coffee Pot Bayou is the perfect start to the day with views to the mansions on Snell Isle.
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| St. Petersburg home. |
The neighborhood is sprinkled with renovated cottages..all cute as can be.
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| Pretty Cottge |
