hi from key west. i've spent a couple days taking care of my brain in two major ways: first, listening its lizard parts that cry out for sunshine, and second, giving myself permission to do something spontaneous and creative for myself. despite my 2-star motel digs, it has felt altogether luxurious to be here.

here's a funny thing: i guess i expected key west to be...less florida?
there's ernest hemingway placards everywhere here--signaling the places he met a wife, wrote, lived. i guess the assumption is he probably drank everywhere on the island, so there really can't be signs for that. before arriving here, i found this quote of hemingway's, about key west:

"[it's] the best place I've ever been anytime anywhere, flowers, tamarind trees, guava trees, coconut palms. ... got tight last night on absinthe and did knife tricks."

and sort of like, ugh, right? hemingway. maybe he was the original florida man? i just picture this blowhard doing knife tricks, starting a fight, but then going home to this epically gorgeous manor and writing. there's another well-known hemingway-ism that he liked living close to the lighthouse as it helped him find his way home drunk.

but tennessee williams, annie dillard, judy blume, shel silverstein and many others also wrote here. (compared to hemingway's mansion, the tennessee williams museum is practically the size of a sunglass hut.) who and how we celebrate tells a pretty specific story--in this case, it's the boomers at capt tony's saloon and sloppy joe's, toasting to hemingway.

the tourist demographic is wild here, man. i've been feeling the i'm old blues from time to time, when my body hurts or nightlife isn't as fun as it used to be, but on this trip i feel like a bonafide youth. key west is teeming with hundreds of white empty-nesters walking around with open containers, smoking cigars cartoonishly, riding motos without helmets, and delighting in the dozens of wretched pro-trump t-shirts every tourist hut is selling. they are traveling in couples and packs-of-couples, and these swarms are here to Get Into The Island Mindset!!!! imagine if daytime bourbon street was sponsored by kohl's and you'd be in the ballpark. the soundtrack is live covers of blues travelers and goo goo dolls songs.

this isn't a gripe tinyletter; i've actually been having a wonderful lil' solitary time! i found out where the cheap happy hours were, which seemed to be frequented by service industry folks on their day off. i've had cuban and caribbean food daily. mostly, i've been researching, doodling, and writing, so between all that output and sunshine, i'm real good.

i've also been looking at lotsa birds. roosters, chickens, and chicks are so prevalent on the island that there's rooster art in all the gift shops. but there are also quail doves and laughing gulls and pigeons and pelicans and vultures and hawks and parrots. i drew a dove for the man sitting next to me at the gay bar, because he said he liked animal that are "are peaceful and nice." i went to a parrot rescue in someone's backyard. bird news.

i spent fourteen years living in florida and took abundant sunshine for granted. however, that (and friendships) might be the only things i miss. sure do wish i could bottle some of this sunshine for all y'all who need it.

tight on yuengling, rhienna