Gratitude for life: Friendship and ‘blue space’ replenish the soul | Candace McKibben – Tallahassee Democrat
Rev. Candace McKibben
Several years ago, my dear seminary friends were planning to come to Florida to tour National Parks here that they had not yet visited. They wanted to come during the winter months when our heat is more tolerable for my friends who love the cold so much they just returned from a trip to Antarctica.
They were able to make the trip to Florida this year and graciously invited my husband and me to join them for part of the journey.
We selected the beginning of their trip, involving meeting up in Miami at an RV park, touring the Biscayne National Park which is 95% water, followed by the Dry Tortugas National Park (99% water), located about 70 miles west of Key West and encompassing Fort Jefferson and seven keys, collectively known as the Dry Tortugas. The Florida Keys stretch from Biscayne Bay to Dry Tortugas National Park, with over 800 keys spanning 180 miles.
It was joyful to be with these dear friends from Richmond, Virginia, and to catch up on our lives. While there is not a lot of research on “friendships,” what those who study it have found is that friends are especially important in adolescence and as we age.
Friendships can survive neglect, and often do, but I am learning that they grow dearer and more meaningful with a little attention. Several times last week during our visit, I found myself hugging one or the other of these longtime friends, just grateful to be in their company.
Playing tourist at home Florida
I am also grateful that these proud Virginians were introducing me and my husband to our home state of Florida. Though both of us are native Floridians, living in the state for the better part of our lives, neither of us had ever been to those particular locations and what we experienced was grand.
We enjoyed a boat trip to the Biscayne National Park, arranged through the Biscayne National Park Institute, a nonprofit tour company authorized by the park. We had a pleasant and competent captain from California who had done her homework on the history of this unusual state park. From Captain Mo I learned the difference between an island and a key, that the first true Florida key is Soldier Key, not Key Largo as I assumed, and about Stiltsville, a group of brightly painted wooden houses on stilts a mile offshore in Biscayne Bay.
Saving Stiltsville
The first such house was built in the early 1930s, and while there were as many as 27 stilt house buildings throughout the years, after Hurricanes Besty (1965) and Andrew (1992), only seven remained. By 1999 there was consideration of dismantling the remaining buildings.
In response, those who knew of and appreciated the quirky offshore village formed a petition to save Stiltsville. With 75,000 people supporting saving the buildings, the National Park Service reversed its decision and the nonprofit Stiltsville Trust formed to rehabilitate and protect the remaining structures, allowing the occasional short-term rental of some of the houses.
Depicted in films, games, literature, and television, Stiltsville is the way many people first learn of Biscayne National Park. In defense of keeping the buildings, Dr. Paul George, historian for the Historical Museum of Southern Florida, said “It really is an only-in-Miami kind of thing. It had an aura, a rascally mischievous past. But it was also just a place people could go to enjoy getting away. It would be a terrible loss.”
More Florida history at Elliot Key
From Stiltsville, we went to Elliot Key where Captain Mo taught us the rich history of transient communities of pioneers who have lived on the island for nearly 10,000 years, including the Tequesta Indians and their ancestors, the Sweety family, an English-Bahamian family of farmers, pirates, and others.
Through the years these people groups engaged in pineapple and key lime farming, sponging, sea turtle and manatee harvesting, wrecking, and other pursuits. In the 1950s there was a debate over building a causeway connecting Elliot Key and Key Largo to Biscayne Key and creating a luxury getaway for the wealthy.
The developers got so far as paving a highway the length of the key, now called the “Spite Road hike.” The conservationist won, and in 1968 President Johnson signed the bill to protect “a rare combination of terrestrial, marine and amphibious life in a tropical setting of great natural beauty,” protecting Elliot Key and the rest of Biscayne Bay as a National Monument. In 1980, it was authorized as a National Park.
Two snorkeling sites with colorful marine life and an hour-long visit of Key Boca Chita with its beautiful lighthouse and chapel as well as gorgeous shorelines, made for a perfect day and a great night’s rest.
Key West and the Dry Tortugas
The next day we drove to Key West and enjoyed sightseeing and rest for the following day’s adventure to the Dry Tortugas National Park. In contrast to the six passengers on the Wednesday tour, 200 of us sailed out of downtown Key West early Friday morning.
The ride was pleasant, the tour-guide informative, the ship and the crew accommodating, and the ocean stunningly beautiful. Standing on the front bow, I recalled a fascinating program on NPR about the healing value of being around large bodies of water.
Immersed in ‘blue space’
“Blue space” researcher and wellness practitioner, Catherine Kelly, says “The sea has a meditative quality – whether it is crashing or still, or you are in the water or observing from the shore, you can immerse yourself in it.” And that is exactly what we did, both metaphorically on the three-hour boat ride to get to the Dry Tortugas, and, literally, as we snorkeled around the seawalls of Fort Jefferson.
The fort was an unbelievable accomplishment, taking up the full 16 acres of Garden Key upon which it is built. Construction began in1846 and continued for the next nearly 30 years, though it was never fully completed or manned.
We learned that the various colors of the 16 million bricks used tell the story of where the bricks were from, including: Florida (primarily), Alabama, Louisiana, and after the Civil War, the dark red bricks of Maine. We learned that the structure itself was so formidable that it served as a giant billboard to would-be challengers to not mess with the United States.
The ride back to Key West across the aquamarine waters shimmering in the sunlight against a setting sun was almost too much beauty to absorb. It felt healing, soothing, comforting, and days later I still feel profoundly grateful for friends, for exploring new and unique places in my home state, for the beauty of the earth, and for a home and community to which we can return.
With all that is unsettled in the world and in our hearts, it is good to create the time to be connected to those we love, to creation, and to self-care, doing that which replenishes our souls. As spring unfolds in all its’ Tallahassee glory around us, may we find the time to immerse ourselves in that which heals us.
The Rev. Candace McKibben is an ordained minister and pastor of Tallahassee Fellowship
