We sat under the blazing sunshine looking at perfectly groomed palm trees enveloping the skyline around the pool. The temperatures of the water and air were perfect for an afternoon lounge.
A neighboring retiree baked his back toward the heat, laying poolside enjoying midday after decades of hard work in Manhattan. On the far side of my in-law’s townhouse, golfers finished their rounds, avoiding the impending heat.
The December warmth seemed more intense than I recalled, though I hadn’t visited Florida during recent years. My parents moved to Whitefish earlier to be a part of a small, northern community.
“Nothing makes sense anymore,” he said as he passed thin Oreo cookies to my father-in-law. It’s a sentiment I’ve thought about in past months as the world seemed complicated, ever-meaner since the pandemic engulfed civilization.
I imagine what working-class retirees throughout our nation thought about recent times. These past years proved hard. Yet hard times is what most elderly working-class people experienced throughout their lives.
The tenacity and fortitude of our parents is inspirational. The world changed underneath the foundation they built with their hands. The technological advances have been breathtaking. It’s easy to understand how complicated it remains for people who grew up with typewriters and phonographs.
Gone are the golden days when people disagreed with grace, modesty, and courtesy. The point to today’s politics feels more about wickedness, meanness, and using the power of government to hurt adversaries while enriching themselves. It makes no sense.
Retirees enjoy the benefit of time. Life experience demands patience and flexibility. Progress moves at its own speed as observed by the magnitude of the adjacent new construction that will house hundreds of snow-birds arriving daily into the Sunshine State.
Across the nation people are mobile, moving great distances to relocate, enjoy life while transferring vast amounts of wealth into new communities. It’s an escalating pattern in recent years, pushing housing prices far past area wages.
It’s the same in Florida as it is in the Flathead Valley. The people are coming and there’s no way back into the history of such “good old days.” We’ve arrived, as many foretold decades earlier.
Some of my youthful impatience has been lost, though it periodically creeps into my words. Decades ago, my state Senate colleague and I sat at Depot Park announcing our legislative intent to conserve thousands of acres of public land surrounding Whitefish Lake.
Enthusiastically, I insisted that in a handful of years we’d be finished. Wow, life offers lessons to the young. Decades later our community succeeded in preserving much land, with years of continued challenge ahead.
The vigor which today’s youth bring to community is vital to our collective success, even as I disagree about some desired political outcomes. I now view the world through prescription glasses and readers.
I remain hopeful the youth of today and elected policymakers embrace the politics of kindness and compromise. Nothing going forward looks easy and local decision-making remain key to success.
It’s easy to recognize the impatience of renters paying thousands monthly to simply live in their community of choice. High density subdivisions seem like an easy solution, though most long-term homeowners will rightfully have plenty to say about the displacement of existing rights.
The new traffic pressures facing my in-law’s retirement community are real as people make a dozen trips daily from home to work, play, or shopping. That’s thousands of new car trips daily bearing down on existing infrastructure and plenty of traffic from just one adjacent development.
We capped our Michelob Ultras and toasted the old days. They live in our memory and we agree it was the best of times. One day even the youth will agree. There’s no stopping the cycle.