Ft Lauderdale FL to New Port Richie, FL 11 '08

St Petersburg Bridge

Sunday morning we headed due west across the state.  The trip took us through the Everglades, where we saw lots of Alligators and American crocodiles basking on the banks of the highway.  Arriving in Fort Meyers, we turned and followed the Gulf Coast North to New Port Richie (just a little North of St Petersburg, FL) which is a Greek fishing port. 

Robin, Cheryl and BJ

It is also home to two of Bruce’s childhood chums: Robin Low Salis and Cheryl Coopersmith and their spouses Teddy and Hal.  We all met at the “Sponge Docks” for a delectable Greek seafood dinner and lots of reminiscing about growing up in Hull.

Dinner and reminiscing at Paul's Shrimp

For Bruce and Robin and Cheryl, the walk down memory lane was fun, for me (as an outsider) it was a fascinating live example of how one builds a “Memory Palace”.   First the three of them laid out the major geographic features of Hull:  Here is the ocean and here is the bay and here is Strawberry Hill. Then they would agree upon the major streets joining these features e.g. here is Beach Ave along the Ocean, and here is Kenburma Street crossing the peninsula.  Then they each added the street where they had lived and populated it with other mutually known families and chums e.g.  Bruce provided Touraine Ave and placed Alice Cohen as living across and down a couple doors from him. They coached each other on their neighbor’s childhood persona, and then caught each other up on any current news they had of that person.  Having agreed upon their own block’s population, they began to systematically work out landmark by landmark, street by street, building by building, and friend by friend.  They added lesser - known but agreed upon landmarks (like the Jewish youth center) as physical reference for where their childhood friends had resided e.g. Michael Colton lived across from the lot that was used for a winter ice skating rink Then they began to include other family and community members in the map.  Joey and Lenny Silvas’s grandfather, who built many of the houses on Touraine Street, lived in the house behind Michael Colton , and the high school history teacher, Charles Whiner  lived over nearby.  By the time the dinner was over, the entire town and all of its 1960s residents had been brought back to memory and their history lovingly updated.  To all those who grew and loved one another in Hull, may you live long and prosper.

Robin, CC and BJ