Connie's Corner

I'm still reading mysteries...

mostly ones by P. D. James...so of course I had to Google her She is ninety years young and still writing, having published her first book in her thirties. When someone asked her how she got her ideas, she said almost always they come from a setting she visits, for example, a sinister looking house or a lonely, decrepit lighthouse (The name of the mystery I'm now reading). Who knew? I thought it was always character or plot. This puts a whole new light on things. And she thinks women are the better mystery writers because they have a greater eye for detail and love to discover the motives behind things...yeess. She says to always live with your senses. Exactly what the Sunrise Class teaches.

Today my senses are telling me I am freezing...a low of 23F expected tonight. Is this really Florida? On my one and lonely trip outside today to the mailbox, I was stiff-legged and huddled over against a cutting breeze only to retrieve "trash mail". Now is the time to remember those springtime trips to Cedar Key with the warm breeze coming in the open windows. I can see the sparkling water as I cross the first bridge and smell that wonderful pungent scent of the tide rolling out, leaving naked oyster beds or perhaps just empty shells on the lonely tidal flats. I slow down to a crawl through the narrow crowded streets and finally I am on Dock Street, a half circle with seafood restaurants and the Gulf on the outside of the crescent and a boat launching inlet on the inside. A truck is backing his boat laden trailer into the blue-green water, waiting while his buddy unhooks and pushes the tri-hull off the tilted trailer. Pelicans sit regally on the sunken creosoted poles of the floating dock. There's Frogs Landing where you can get Palm Salad, hearts of palm topped with a pistacchio colored peanut buttery ice cream. And look, there's that rickety stilted shack sitting out past the dock with the electric wires strung to it over the water. How can that thing still be standing? Does somebody really live there? A shrimp boat is docked but it's deserted except for one guy separating sea sponges. I want some. They are perfect for dabbing watercolors. I carefully walk down the few steps off the main dock to his floating side dock and buy a plastic bag full. They smell like the ocean. Off in the distance I see little islands. A tiny one-man sailboat is tacking southward across the horizon. This is happiness.

Until next time....c