Can't Live With Them -- Or Without Them

 
By Elaine Viets

 

I live in Fort Lauderdale. Like most Floridians, I enjoy hearing visitors say, "It's so beautiful. I wish I could live here."

Life in this so-called paradise is a paradox: We want your money, tourists, but we'd like you to hand over your cash and leave quietly. We'd rather you didn't jam our favorite restaurants and major roads – that pleasure is for locals. And if you do fall in love with the place, love it and leave it. We're not putting out the welcome mat for more people.

In my Dead-End Job novels, Helen Hawthorne, her new husband Phil and their landlady Margery Flax live at the Coronado Tropic Apartments. They consider themselves natives, though only Margery is Florida born. The three debate the paradise paradox in this short excerpt from "Pumped for Murder," my tenth Dead-End Job Mystery. There really is a Fifteenth Street Fisheries. Both tourists and locals can feed the  giant tarpon in the marina by the restaurant.

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Out by the pool, they were blasted by the noonday heat. Margery was skimming bougainvillea blossoms off the pool surface and flipping them on the lawn with swift, expert movements. Helen thought the pile of damp purple flowers was too pretty for yard trash.

"Good morning," Helen called.

"Good afternoon," Margery said. "Off to work?"

"Out to lunch," Phil said. "Want to go with us?"

"No thanks, I have a date with a rake."

"Sounds racy," Helen said.

"There's nothing romantic about yard work," Margery said, "though it is forever. Where are you going?"

"Thought we might try the Fifteenth Street Fisheries," Phil said.

"The last time I was there, the place was overrun with tourists," Helen said.

"You make it sound like it has roaches," Margery said. "They're not an infestation. If we're lucky, we get tourists. We live in a tourist destination. We all make our living off tourists, one way or another. We spend millions luring them down here. Then we don't want to be around them. I don't know why. People from the Midwest are more polite than Floridians."

"The New Yorkers aren't," Helen said.

"Some New Yorkers," Phil said. "I like the Big Apple variety." 

"I said Midwesterners," Margery said. "We can debate the other states later. Midwestern tourists are polite. They're less likely to cut you off in traffic. They're quieter than Floridians. They don't drink as much as we do or run around naked, except during spring break. So why do Floridians think there's something wrong with a restaurant when the tourists go there?"

"It's not the tourists," Helen said. "Restaurants cut back on the quality of the food and service if they get too many tourists. They figure the tourists won't be back again, so they can treat them badly. A restaurant that caters to locals has to keep higher standards, all year long."

"The Fifteenth Street Fisheries is under new management," Phil said. "We'll look at the boats in the marina, have a drink and dinner."

 

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I agree with Margery, but sympathize with Helen. I like walking into a restaurant now that the tourist season is over and getting a table without waiting. But I want that restaurant to survive. Most of them make their money from Thanksgiving through May, South Florida's main tourist season.

No point feeling superior to tourists. I'm one, too.

I admires the upfront approach of panhandlers in tourist-rich Washington DC . They followed me down the street screaming, "Give me your money, bitch."

Until I discovered they were in Congress.