Deerfield is a sort of buffer zone between Boca Raton (home of the golden girls and polo grounds) and Fort Lauderdale (Wealthy tourists slumming away from South Beach and 20-30something party central for those not up to the gyrations of Miami.)

Boca was my stomping grounds while at FAU and the library… my first solo apartment was a a dinky studio behind Mizner park. It was a pretty laid-back lifestyle, all told. Work at the BBCL, hang out / game with JTD (later, game with graypumpkin and the two squads; Wu’s on one day, Pam on the other.) Crushing/hanging out with Sheleah (Sheila) at Liberties, watching quantum leap at the house. Hermit crabs as pets. So broke that I couldn’t afford a telephone, let alone the internet. Gaming, school, and reading were my primary hobbies, but I dug playing a wide assortment of pirated Atari ST games when I could wrangle them from Brett. I learned Unix and a lot of CAD at that time, too. (free software and free time begot an education… who knew?)

I didn’t much mind being lower class in Boca. I knew a lot of nice people, was safe, and in relatively good health, save for when my back went out. GP & Katt helped me a great deal during that time, which is something that I really appreciate to this day. Also helpful were the Wu’s, during my homeless phase, not to mention Danny and his wife pulling my fat out of the fire, too… I get along poorly with friend’s wives, save for Katt, but she wasn’t a wife of a friend, she actually fell into he friend slot on her own… just happened to be married to another friend (I could hang out with either/or, or both at the same time, it was all good). I miss gabbing with her now and then. Though we cleared the air a few years back, conversation didn’t really resume like it did with her hubby.

A lot of things have happened in my life since then. Pompano was quite a paradigm shift. I was pretty depressed from about 6 months before GP & Katt moved west through about ’95-96. I met and hung out with the hippies, self-medicated with kind bud, drum circles and actually dancing a bit. They welcomed me and gave me a chance to reboot my brain with mushroom tea, lots of affection and camp outs. That gave me much opportunity to soften my armor and relax a bit.

The thing about Deerfield is that it’s to Boca as Pompano is to Fort Lauderdale. or, Delray’s equal to the South. I don’t know for sure yet, but I think that I might just prefer smaller towns, as long as the cool stuff is still reasonably nearby. Museums, theaters, books are all right around the bend, without as much hubbub.

When I ride the bus from Deerfield, through Pompano to Lauderdale, I feel emotional warm and cold spots. Specific regions make me happier or sadder… and one block sort of makes me feel very, very tired. I’m not sure what sets it off… time of day doesn’t seem to enter into the picture. Maybe some kind of subconscious reaction to a building or landscape? Who can say? Maybe certain feelings pool in different areas until other people pick them up or cancel them out? I’m prone to suspect that it’s more a weird Scotto thing than an “external emotion projector bombarding me” thing.

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