It all started with a park: The Florida Chronicles, pt. 1

Tons of people have asked why we made the decision to uproot our family, sell our house, leave our church, our friends, and our loved ones and move to the beach.  While I can’t speak for my husband in regards to his reasoning, for me, it all started with a park.

But let me back up some.  About 4 years ago (after numerous staycations to save money) we found ourselves in a position to take a decent vacation to the beach and were asking around as far as a good place to try.

Someone recommended we go to St. Augustine, FL. Tim & I had never heard of it but the more we researched it, the more certain we were that it was our next vaca destination.  It is the oldest city in the united states and chalked FULL of history, which is something we enjoy as a family.

So we booked our trip and off we went!

When I first laid eyes on St. Augustine beach and the old city, I fell in love.  And not just like “I like you, check yes or no”, type high school love.  Not the type of love like “Man, I love donuts!”  I’m talking, like you’ve just stumbled upon a missing piece of your life you never knew about and suddenly feel completely whole, type of love.  The type of love that sweeps you off your feet and makes you feel like anything is possible.  The type of love that feels like THIS is what you were made for.  The type of love that welcomes you home. THAT love.

It was like I had stepped back in time.  The bay is lined with a beautiful old city coastal skyline with deep historical roots running in every direction.  You have the Spanish influence, early settlers, pirates and native Americans.  Every where you turned in down town, there was more to see and I was stunned into a state of awe with the beauty of it all.

The beach was equally as amazing but in a different way.  It was clean and not crowded at all.  I watched our boys play in the waves as they crashed onto the beach and spread their fingers along the sand before rolling back out to the skyline. I observed the smiles as Owen & Noah ran up and down the shore, mesh bags in tow, looking for just the right shell to take home.  And for the first time in my life, I felt a sense of peace that grew inside and flowed all the way down to my toes as they felt the sand beneath my feet. But with that peace there was also a sting of sadness of knowing this was all temporary.  Why did it have to be so fleeting??

Our first trip to St. Augustine went so fast that we didn’t even get to do half of the things there were to do and left us longing for “next time” even as we headed north, back to Tennesseee.

It would be a couple of years before we could make it back and when we decided that we were going for a 2nd time, I was elated.  Our first visit to St. Augustine, several years earlier, left me so much deeper in love with the city then I initially realized.  Sure, I had been to the beach before and seen similar sites.  But there is a magic that resides over St. Augustine, Florida that is completely unrivaled by any other beach I’ve ever been to within the U.S.  I simply could not believe how lucky I was to not only go once but to be able to go BACK for a second time??

So we booked our trip and went again and it was like coming home.

We got to see the areas that we didn’t get to the first visit.  The same magic was duplicated on the beach as we watched turtles make their way over sand dunes, boats anchoring in the distance, and some of the most beautiful storms roll over the water that were so sculpted that you couldn’t help but imagine God, himself, shaping each cloud.  To say we were in our element was putting it mildly.  We had found a place that pulled us to it like a magnet and coated us with a sense of purpose we had yet to experience, as a family.

On one particular day, in the old city, we were taking the trolley (or the “Charlie” as Noah used to call it) around the Plaza de la Constitucion.  Its a beautiful central park at the foot of the Bridge of Lions.  Noah’s head was sleep against my shoulder.  Owen and Tim were on the other side of the trolley, people watching.  And as we rounded the sides of the park, I could see people with their dogs, walking.  There was a couple laying on a blanket, talking.  One person was propped up against a street, reading a book.  And at that moment, it dawned on me.  These people weren’t tourists, they LIVED here.  And I envied them for it.  In that instance, all I wanted to do was be them. I wanted to be reading that book, laying on that blanket, next to the bridge of lions. And why shouldn’t that be me?  Better yet, why COULDN’T that be me?

I didn’t mention any of this to Tim because by the time we packed up our Airbnb condo and were loading the car, I had brushed the entire idea off as wishful thinking. It was too absurd , too outrageous, too risky.  We could never leave Tennessee, our family, our friends, our church. No way.  No how.  Until…..Tim turned to me in the parking lot of Beacher’s Lodge and said “What if we just moved here?”

My initial reaction was that he was out of his mind.  But then I thought back to the park, the blanket, the dogs, the books.  I remembered the serenity of the waves, the peace of belonging and the ease of which this place felt like home.  And so I turned back to him and said “Ok, let’s do it!”

And so we began writing our “Next Chapter”.