It's time for a reality check ...

Miami, Florida

At this time of year in Pennsylvania, when temperatures are in the 20s, a lot of folks start dreaming about Miami.  

And whenever I tell people I grew up in Miami, people always say the same thing:

“Why did you ever leave?”

Don’t get me wrong:  I like Miami.  It was interesting growing up there and I still like to go back from time to time.  There are parts of Miami that are beautiful, exciting and fascinating.  And the blended culture – Anglo and a hodge-podge of Caribbean and Latin American influences – makes it an adventure; it’s like leaving the continental U.S. and going to a largely Hispanic tropical country that doesn’t require a passport and accepts U.S. currency at face value.

What’s not to like about that? 

However, when people ask me why I ever left, it’s obvious that they’re from someplace else.  Probably the Northeast or the Midwest.  Chances are they’ve only visited there.  Or have only seen something on the Travel Channel. 

Clearly they’ve never lived there for any period of time, as I did. 

If they did, they’d know the following:

Living in Miami is different than visiting there …

First of all, Miami is not all of South Florida, but all of South Florida is pretty much like Miami. The only difference is that the further south you go, the flatter and hotter it is, the more congested the traffic, the more hostile the natives are, and the less English you'll hear.  

The killer is really the heat and humidity.  If you’ve flown there, you‘ll remember when you landed and the door opened to the jet way. 

That first rush of hot moist air was like walking into a steam room.  It felt good then. 

Now imagine day after day of that same unrelenting heat and humidity.  You’re always hot.  You’re always sweaty.  And nothing ever dries.  Including you. 

In a polo shirt and shorts it’s tolerable.  But think of wearing long pants and a long-sleeved shirt, and on top of that a jacket.  You can’t go out to a nice place for dinner – or a wedding or funeral -- in shorts, so guys will at some time be wearing a sport coat and long pants. You will suffer.

Now it’s true that practically every place in Miami is air-conditioned, so you just have to scurry from one air-conditioned outpost to another.  

Another strategy is to wait until the sun goes down and the temperature may drop from 85-88 degrees to a “refreshing” 78 degrees.  Still 80-90% humidity.  Time to open the windows, right?  

But you still have to get from your house to your car to wherever you’re going, so you will be outside and trust me, that heat and humidity day after day will wear you down.   

Nice for a week’s vacation after you’ve been freezing your butt off.  Sucks after a year or so. 

  

Miami is flat, and every day is pretty much like every other …

A friend of mine in Florida – who moved to South Florida from Canada – once remarked how flat it was. 

“You can watch your dog running away for three days …” is how he put it. 

Now when you’ve never been anyplace else, you don’t know anything different.  But once you’ve been someplace with hills you realize how flat Miami is.  There’s no going back. 

That leads to a kind of sameness about Miami.  You’re never going up or down or over a hill, unless you’re in a highway with overpasses and underpasses.  There’s nothing new or exciting over the ridge because there is no ridge.  The only things that break the flat horizon line are buildings.  The only change in the topography is manmade. 

The same goes for the weather.  There are hot, really hot, and somewhat less hot days.  There’s really little difference.  It’s pretty predictable.  It will rain someplace every day.  It will be cooler early in the morning – but only in a relative way – and hotter with a breeze later that day. 

The only thing that breaks this monotony is a severe tropical storm—common – or a hurricane – not that common.  When a big tropical storm dumps inches of rain, as soon as it passes steam rises up from the roads adding even more humidity.  There are occasional freak cold snaps where it might dip down into the 60s, or God forbid the 50s – time to break out those winter clothes – but those are rare.

There aren’t seasons as most of us know them.  It’s always summer; there’s no fall, winter or spring.  The leaves don’t change color.  There’s never a crisp snap in the air for a few weeks.  No snow.  No watching trees budding in spring.  That’s because nothing ever really changes; there’s nothing to look forward to except more of the same.    

There’s only a season when there are more out-of-towners, and a season when there are somewhat fewer.  It’s not quite as hot in the former; a bit hotter in the latter. 

While that monotony appeals to the winter-weary in the North, when you live there year round it can seem like you’re unstuck in time.  And you’ll find you miss the seasons. 

Habla espanol? 

If the answer is no, you’re in for a surprise. And you can pretty much kiss off getting a good job in Miami if that job entails dealing with the local public. 

That’s because the majority of people in Miami speak Spanish a lot of the time; some only speak Spanish, or pretend not to understand English when it serves them.  Like virtually all service people you’ll have to deal with.  Like every place you try to call locally – the bank, the auto repair shop, the air-conditioner guy – and most waitstaff in hotels and restaurants.

It’s not such a big deal for most locals – they’re used to it.  And most Hispanics there do speak a little English, but it’s not their first choice.  Plus, when they know you don’t speak any Spanish, they can talk about you to each other freely.

And they will. 

Here are some key terms to listen for:

• Pendejo (pendeja – female) means “asshole”  …  As in: “Que el pendejo” (what an asshole …)

• Marico means “faggot” ; maricon means “huge faggot” … (the worst insult to a Hispanic)

• Besame el culo means “kiss my ass” …
  Don’t let that warm smile fool you.  To the local Hispanics, most native Anglos – and ALL tourists – are pendejos in Miami.  And if you think differently, you can besame el culo. 

It’s Mother Nature’s funhouse …

Thanks to the climate, some well-meaning but misguided early residents, and gross stupidity by some current inhabitants, South Florida is an ad hoc ecological experiment gone haywire. 

It’s not nice to fool Mother Nature and upset her balance.  This is her blowback. 

Every strange tropical species lives there – giant, fearless cockroaches that fly; walking catfish; piranha; scorpions; exotic ants; boa constrictors; poisonous toads; and of course alligators and many, many more creepy, crawly, biting, bizarre things on land and in the water.

The ever-present dampness and heat also offer you a rich variety of otherwise unusual fungal diseases, rashes and infections, not to mention almost epidemic athlete’s foot and jock itch. In Miami, there’s almost always a fungus among us.

Alligators, mosquitos, a species of deer, some birds, a few flowering plants, and a few other animals and insects are actually indigenous to Florida. Practically everything else was brought in by somebody, either intentionally or by accident.   

Most of the more exotic flora was brought in from Indonesia.  Florida’s famous oranges originally came from Spain.  Most of the tropical fruits – like bananas – also came from somewhere else.  Then you have the experiments gone awry, like Melaleuca trees from Australia – planted in the Everglades to drain the swamp –and now a nasty invasive species. 

And if it ever grew, crawled or slithered in a rainforest – plant, beast, or insect – it thrives in South Florida.  It’s probably there right now.  And surprise – because the genius that brought it didn’t bring along its natural predators that kept it under control in whatever steaming, mucky, pestilent environment where it grew naturally, it’s now out of control.  Thanks a bunch. 

You and the kids might find all this biodiversity fascinating.  Residents, not so much. 
The first time you see a coral snake in your front yard, find scorpions in your garage, see something crawling on you that looks like it’s from a Tim Burton movie, or have giant roaches fly toward you in broad daylight, you’ll be less than enthused. 

In South Florida, and especially Miami, Mother Nature is a bitch.    

Have a great time.