Marina Island Kid…

It was really a peninsula, but I suppose somewhere along the way, someone thought ‘Marina Island’ sounded better than ‘Marina Peninsula.’

My life at Lemon Bluff, although significant, was followed by life in Sanford, life in Merritt Island, life at Lake Hamilton and theeennnnn life at Marina Island. By the time I arrived at Marina Island, I’d attended 11 elementary schools.

Located in Seminole County Florida, Marina Island seemed like a man-made peninsula that was randomly plopped on the Saint John’s River and designed to be a quintessential Old Florida fish camp, but it lacked the soul Lemon Bluff held tightly in its Spanish moss covered live oak trees.

I felt so alone at Marina Island. Our home was a fifth wheel camper with a living room and bedroom built on the front for me. The energy on that island that was really a peninsula was volatile. Because of this living situation, I NEVER invited anyone from school over and I never told anyone how bad it really was, although I did have one friend in school whose Momma must’ve known…I was regularly invited to her beautiful home and welcomed on family vacations. Not too long ago, I thanked her for not judging my living situation and giving me the chance to show her that I wasn’t defined by my circumstances. No doubt- kids really do remember who was there for them.

Happy memories at Marina Island were mostly all on the docks, listening to my Sony Walkman (Sinéad O’Connor’s ‘Nothing Compares 2 U’ on constant rewind). And the smell of home after school…Mom would somehow whip up the best dinners in that little kitchen of hers. The smell of freshly fried pork chops, accompanied with the sound of early years Oprah Winfrey coming from the television makes me smile today…because even if it wasn’t much, Mom was still doing her best to make it home.

We didn’t have a phone- although there was a pay phone outside the camp store and mom always made sure I had quarters. And anyone I loved who lived long distance from me ALWAYS accepted collect calls and we sometimes talked for hours (thanks Mama B!).

The water that flowed through our faucets was directly from the river. And if you know anything about the Saint John’s, you know that sucker is as black as water gets because the current is ridiculously slow, uncommonly flows north and it is considered one of the laziest rivers in the world.

Mom would buy all of the water we consumed in our home and we showered down at the camp. It’s so wild to think that every morning before school, I would gather my TRESemmé shampoo, Dial soap and towel and make my way down to the showers where all of the other people in the community (many of them fishermen) also bathed themselves.

The community wasn’t a final place for anyone. It seemed everyone was in some sort of transition.

There were periods in which other kids lived at Marina Island. It wasn’t unusual for us to pull one another on knee boards behind aluminum fishing boats…launching right off the muddy banks because nobody wanted to be strapping into a knee board with alligators lurking beneath them. And once your ride was over, the driver would whip the boat around in a manner that allowed to you be slung right back up to that muddy bank. The learning curve for kneeboarding was steep.

There were so many animals all around. On any given day, I’d be playing with opossums, skunks, big snakes, little crabs and even baby gators on that island that was really a peninsula. Of course, everyone did a lot of fishing and frogging. Cleaning catfish and frogs was always the same to me, ‘First you chop off their heads…then you pull off their britches.’

And I still remember the roar of the airboats launching next to our home…also right off the bank. Current day, I wish the airboat rides people take charter busses to over in the Everglades were more authentic. There certainly were no charter busses coming to Marina Island to take 20-plus people for a ride through the marsh on one single boat. Just two seaters, stocked with a cooler of beer for the people and some marshmallows for the gators.

Marina Island- the peninsula…you were immeasurably hard on me, but I’ll always respectfully tip my hat to you because you showed me how to see beauty in a seemingly un-beautiful world. And most importantly, you taught me that wanting more meant doing all it took to earn more.

Love,

The Marina Island Kid

Afterthoughts…

When I wrote this, I just dumped it all on my keyboard without much thought about the gift that Marina Island ultimately is to me. I’ve carried the gift of this secret place in my journey into every classroom, every interview room, every board room and every charitable event I’ve attended and will continue to in the years to come. I think it has been a driver in most everything I’ve done. It pushes me, humbles me and most importantly, it gives me the gift of being able to explore perspectives and know that what you see in a person isn’t always who they are and what they’ve experienced. Grace is both a gift to the receiver and the giver…and to me, the foundation of grace is an understanding that you really don’t know why people choose to do what they do- good and bad- we are all driven by experiences. So above all, choose grace…