Kevin Robinson's Blog, page 4

Sailing on a Breeze

Most days here in the Florida Keys are just perfect.�� I suspect that��various and sundry��of you reading that sentence feel differently about it depending on how much Puritan influence your upbringing contained.�� As a boy, growing up in a Puritanical Protestant church, such a declaration was generally frowned upon.�� Only God is perfect.�� And, if we hope to reach perfection (the Calvinists called it "sanctification"), than we must trudge through Life, the Universe, and Everything (dreary and "lost"

The Heart of a Hunter

As a kid, my three dogs through the years were a Scottish Terrier, a Great Dane/Boxer mix, and a Sheltie Collie mix.���� In college, I was introduced to the Beagle.�� I was returning to the dorm one night after a long day of classes, followed by a longer afternoon and evening of pumping gas, checking dip sticks, and fixing flat tires in the freezing late autumn��rain of Western Pennsylvania.�� The streets were fine, but when I pulled into the parking lot my dorm shared with an identical looking

There's a Ball in Boot Key Harbor

A��dear friend, nurse, author, sailor, and licensed boat Captain��used to live aboard her sailboat at��Boot Key Harbor, here in Marathon FL.�� As I mentioned in a previous blog post, anchorages like this world famous one are just as surely communities��as is any neighborhood on shore.�� The picture of Boot Key Harbor above gives you an idea of the typical marina��layout.�� Each vessel is tied off to a floating "ball," which, in turn, is securely anchored to the harbor's bottom, and the "painter" on each

Crossing the Seven Mile Bridge

Such a gorgeous morning to scramble out to my dentist in Big Pine Key.�� (Best dentist ever!)�� If you've got to have a tooth extracted and a temporary bridge installed, driving over and back across the famous Seven Mile Bridge on an utterly perfect day in the Florida Keys is absolutely the best way to go about it.�� As you drive across the bridge today, you can see most of the old bridge to the west.�� When I was a kid, the old Overseas Highway had only recently been renovated from Flagler's grand

Great Adventures

It's easy to assume that an athletic young man who breaks his neck at 24,��loses all feeling and mobility from the chest down��along with��the use of his fingers, will, if he survives the ordeal, have to adjust to a drab life devoid of adventure.�� Nothing could be farther from the truth.�� Life, the Universe, and Everything (as Douglas Adams calls the great IT) is an adventure from birth to death and beyond.�� After my accident,��it began to dawn on me that perhaps I had been misled.�� Or,��maybe we

Where Have All the Flowers Gone?

It���s a Stormy Monday here in the islands.�� The sun came out yesterday, but it rained off and on throughout the night.�� Today is a perfect day to stay home and write.�� I finished Chapter 11 over the weekend and got well into Chapter 12 on my new novel.�� Today, with no sun to temp me outside, perhaps I���ll progress faster!

I���ve been getting acquainted recently with Sir Richard F. Burton���s translation on The Arabian Nights, or, as it���s sometimes called, A Thousand Nights, and a Night.�� Like most

Rituals for the Heart

Selling a house is no big deal.�� But selling a home is a different experience.�� I only know this now because I���m having the experience for the first time.�� St. Mulligan���s Last Resort was my first home.�� I���ve never felt attached to any apartment or house I���ve ever lived in or owned before.�� Even the two houses I grew up in.�� I guess I have fond memories of the little cabin my folks owned in the Catskills when I was a kid.�� Summers there were fun, but I deliberately stayed out of the cabin as many

It's Only Words

What a beautiful day in the Florida Keys!�� The sun is back, and while Ellie video taped the Master Suite level here at St. Mulligan���s Last Resort, I thought I was ���hiding��� out on the 3rd floor deck reading Denise Low���s wonderful new book, Jackalope.�� But, instead, this latest video has a Hitchcock-esque cameo of me from the back.�� We tried for three months to hire a well known drone photographer to fly around and through St. Mulligan���s Last Resort, but despite repeated promises, he just never

Waiting for the Sun

There's been a ten year semi-draught here in the Keys.�� When I was a kid, it rained often, but since Ellie and I moved down eleven years ago,��only the last��couple of years have returned to a more typical "tropical" weather pattern.�� Storms flit across the ocean, the bay, and the islands, sometimes raining in the front yard while it's warm and sunny out back.�� Last year we experienced dozens of rain showers which lasted 60 seconds or less, but this year has begun with extended cloudy days and

Hump Day in the Keys

My first sailboat, well, my mom's first sailboat really, was an 8-foot gaff rigged wooden pram.�� Mom loved the song "Red Sails in the Sunset," and began badgering my dad for a sailboat with a red sail.�� We owned a little cabin on a lake in the Catskills, we had a row boat and an old beat-up wood and canvas canoe, but nether of those ever appealed to her.�� Our second��summer there my dad showed up with a surprise for my mom.�� Yup, you guessed it, a little pram with a red sail.�� He took her out to