I Found the Fountain of Youth... it's in Delray Beach Florida

Sometime during the 1500's Ponce de Leon searched for The Fountain of Youth, and discovered Florida. Right there under his nose WAS the Fountain of Youth, I found it in Delray Beach... My mom and I took a trip to Florida to visit my Aunt and Uncle who moved there for good last year from Hamden. My Uncle Al has Parkinsons, and my Aunt has had a few operations for cancer. So it was important to bring my mom there to see them.

I turned 50 last year, and while I'm not in the best shape of my life, I look better than most 50 year olds, in fact, in my mind I still feel 20, I'm as "hip" as a 40 year old but I actually look 60.... But the truth is, I never felt so alive and young , (at least since I can remember) as I did this past week.

We arrived Wednesday afternoon, after flying on Jet Blue, my mom was a neurotic mess, worrying about the flight being canceled. We made it and my mom and I were able to wedge our ways into the plush baby car seat sized airplane seats, (I brought a large shoe horn to squeeze are asses into the seat)...

So just after takeoff, a large woman felt it necessary to jump in the vacant seat in front of me. My knees still have the imprint of the emergency evacuation directions on them. Once the lady buckled up, she whipped her seat back as far as it could go... so my knees are jammed in the seat, my nose inches from the headrest, and my nostrils flaired from the overpowering perfume she bathed in. GREAT, only another 2 or so hours from now I'll be in Florida. The only saving grace was the fact that JetBlue serves Dunkin Donuts on the plane. On takeoff, my mother grabbed my hand, (the last time I held hands with my mom, I was 9 years old and crossing a city street), Thanks mom, for the cockblocking, any available woman that may or may not think I was a nice guy, assumed I was with a rich old woman. If they only knew...

We landed in West Palm, and headed over to the Hertz counter to rent the car... once in the courtesy bus, I chose to stand, and real annoying..er I mean nice guy driving us to Hertz, told me I had to sit down... fresh off a grasshopper position on the plane I needed to stretch my legs, I proceeded to sarcastically ask the driver why the bus was equipped with hand rails from the ceiling, wasn't that for people who stand.. My mom was politely telling me to act like a duck and let the water roll off my back... and to sit down... Oh yeah, we were off to a great start...

Once we got the car, we drove 15 miles south to Delray.. We stopped at the local Publix (grocery store) to buy flowers for my Aunt. I dropped my mom at the front door and told her I'd be right in once I parked the car... It took 20 minutes, I had to wait until the folks crossed in front of me to get to the store from the parking lot. Unfortunately, the people that were crossing in front of my car weren't moving that quickly, in fact once I got into the parking lot, my mom was heading out of the store, "I thought you were coming inside?" Yeah well, I thought so too... It reminded me of the Michael Jackson Thriller video, it was the land of Zombies, except the only difference was they moved slower than zombies, and they didn't have the strength to have their arms outstretched. But most if not all of them...looked dead already..

We were staying at Lee's condo, he was married to my Uncles sister Marian who passed away a few years back, formerly of Hamden too, he was going to stay at his new girlfriends condo around the corner... My mom got the master bedroom suite and I got what I'm sadly used to, the pullout couch... The place was nice, but it was built for shriveling old people... The bathroom sink I was using came up to my thighs, and if I tried to drown my self in the sink, my head wouldn't have fit in it. While shaving, my left shoulder was pressed against the wall, my right shoulder pressed against the glass shower door.. The shower was another obstacle... Once in the shower my head towering over the nozzle head, when I bent down a bit to wash my hair, my knees hit the wall and my fat ass pressed against the glass shower doors... one time I tried to bend over and soap up my shins and feet...I almost knocked myself out, hitting my head on the soap bar holder...

So Wednesday nite we head out to Lucille's, a great barbeque joint in Boynton Beach. You all know how much I like knawing on meat on a bone,.... I had the BBQ shrimp... I had the hostess laughing, asking for a box of crayons and a kids seat and menu... Ordering food was a treat, Lee is hard of hearing, my Uncles speech isn't great, my mom and Aunt can't see and I'm sweating wedged between my moms left boob and Lee's hairy right arm.... Yeah dinner was great...

We drop my Aunt and Uncle back at their place and head back to Lee's condo to retire for the night... I make my pull out bed, and my mom jumps into my bed and wants to talk... "Isn't this fun?" she asked... Yeah, like that root canal I had when I was 22... I convinced her to get a good nite sleep, she went down the hall to her palatial surroundings and I got under the two paper blankets left for me and turned on the state of the art 12 inch TV... I awoke sometime in the middle of the night, freezing, only to hear my mom's TV on a little bit too loud. I showed her how to work the sleep timer the next night.

Thursday my mom went with my Aunt to her chemo, my Uncle went to F.A.U. for art classes, it was my only day to myself. I drove around and found a D.D. for coffee, and acclimated myself with the neighborhood. I stopped into a restaurant for breakfast, and besides the help, I was the youngest there, I got a lot of stares, apparently they aren't used to seeing unaccompanied Kid's there. After breakfast I realized I could make a ton of money dyeing hair, I saw more bold colors than a paint store.. There's gotta be a big market for hair coloring..

That nite we stayed in and had chinese food with my Aunt Cele and Uncle Al... My mother and Aunt bickered back and forth like they were 8 and 12. My uncle told my aunt what he wanted and she corrected him to what he was going to get. We sat at a 1960's fold up card table with a big lazy susan. The ordering process took a while and it was then i realized I was never going to get a "quick" meal here...

Friday morning we went to breakfast... Helped Uncle Al into and out of the car and helped guide him and his walker. Aunt Cele and my mom snipped at each other over what we were getting... good times!!

Friday my mom wanted to see the beach, so I drove her the beach and helped her to a lounge chair... She was cockblocking again... calling me honey and lovey...
That afternoon I piled them in the car and took them to Deerfield Beach for my Aunts after chemo shot, my aunt was backseat driving and my mother was telling her sister what a good driver I was... My uncle mumbled to me from the passenger seat, "you think it's easy..huh?"

Once at the medical center, getting my Uncle situated in the waiting room, surrounded by 100 year cancer patients waiting to see the Doctors, my mom came out and joined us, apparently my Aunt told her to leave her... Some old guy comes in and asked the receptionist if he could use a phone for a ride, she directed him across the room and he called, while on the phone, with the bustle of a busy office, TV on for the waiting room and the phones ringing, this guy lets out one of the loudest farts I've ever heard in my life, and it lasted a good 30 seconds... I glanced at my uncle and he was shaking his head left to right, the receptionist put her head down and covered her nose with her shirt, I glanced at my mom to my right and she had the look on her face like I came home with 4 D's on my report card... I held my breath, closed my eyes and tried not to burst out laughing... I made contact with the receptionist and we both smirked and I looked away, I was about to lose it...

At night we waited for Lee and Alma to arrive from there volunteer work at the Tennis Match and they decided to go to The Ale House... We had to take 2 cars since there was 6 of us, my Uncle wasn't feeling that strong so we took the wheelchair and the walker. The drive there should have taken 10 minutes, it seemed like 10 hours, Lee being very cautious, didn't want to lose me, so he drove slow... So slow that that idle on my rent a car would have smashed into his back bumper, so i drove the whole way there riding the breaks, I fit right in with the rest of the drivers in Florida. Once I got my uncle out of the car and into the restaurant I parked the car. Once again, I got wedged in a booth with my mom to my left and to my right was Alma, who lathered herself with perfume for her new beau Lee... By the time the food came, I was stressing out, sweating and had to turn my shoulders just to use a fork.. 10 minutes into the meal Alma took my fork and instead of trying to get the very busy servers attention I ate my meal with my fingers. Not quite finished with my meal, I asked if I could get up, 3 minutes later when Alma moved I was FREE... I went over to the bar, and told our server that if they needed me that that's where I'd be.

I drove them back home took my mom back to Lee's and made up a story that I was going out for snacks... I drove back to the beach and I finally saw young peers.. By the beach in Delray, there were a bunch of clubs with youngsters spilling out into the streets, I sat on the side of the road smoking a cigar with the handicap pass hanging from the mirror... No one even noticed me... When i got back to the condo I had to wake my drooling mom up and told her to go into her own bed... I also set the sleep timer for her and proceeded to try and sleep... All in all, I got maybe 6 hours of sleep the whole trip, and when I woke up the first thing I saw was my mom standing over me, asking me if I was awake, by the time I uttered my sleepy reply she was carrying on about the flight (that was scheduled 6 hours later) and she was worried about it being canceled. she was telling me that we had to clean the place, had to laundry and was demanding me to call JetBlue and to contact my sister to see WHO was picking us up at the airport. Since I've been waking upo alone for a long time now, I wasn't receptive to this muich instruction so early in the morning.. My mother started bitching to me, (obviously taking out her frustration at not winning arguments with my Aunt on me), and we snapped at each other, ahhh just like old times... I took off to get coffee and bought my mom a jelly donut for a peace offering... it worked, after she gave me a passive aggressive apology...

We took my Aunt and Uncle out for a last breakfast, that took a good 3 hours, once back at their condo, I hung a bunch of paintings that my Uncle painted, every picture I hung took 20 minutes, my Uncle wanted this one here, my Aunt wanted that one there... They argued about selection and placement on every one...and then we headed to the airport for the flight home.

Five times on the plane she asked me why I didn't have a jacket, I explained that I would be okay and that Wayne and Wendy were picking us up and I wasn't walking home in the cold from White Plains...

Once back in Woodbridge I was greeted by open arms from the only one that really missed me... Actually is was open paws, as Bear was wagging his tail for HIS favorite Uncle...

As torturous as it was, I was glad I got to see them both of them... I was able to get some good stories from my Uncle about his time in the service as a seaman on the Aircraft Altamaha. We did a family tree of my maternal heritage, with conflicting facts by my mom and Aunt.. All in all it was a good trip...

Ponce de Leon was right the Fountain of Youth IS in Florida, because I never felt so young as I did that week...