I first experienced Tampa, Florida in 1969. I was in the Navy and sent to Tampa to catch a destroyer going out on maneuvers in the Gulf of Mexico. I arrived early....rented a motel room on Bayshore Blvd in Tampa, about two blocks from the famous Henry Plant Hotel/Museum. I spent two days walking the city before reporting for duty. I had never been to Florida and was eager to drink in as much of it as I could. Thirteen years later, 1982, Linda, Lisa and I packed up and moved from Indiana to the Tampa Bay Area. I bought a small trucking company and usually delivered to Tampa a couple times a week. There is no city, that I have experienced, that has the smells of Tampa. The smell of Cuban coffee on Adamo Drive going into Tampa in the morning. The smell of the Florida State Fair...pronto pups and cotton candy. Cuban bread baking at the bakeries in Ybor City or Holsum Bakery on Hillsborough Avenue. Orange blossoms driving down Armenia Avenue when there were groves on both sides of t
Linda and I have been crying a lot lately. It is random. Little things set us off.
Our only child, Lisa, has been gone now for nine years. There is no way it has been that long. I think of her every day.
Now......my only brother, Chuck, is in a battle for his life.
When I suspected that something was drastically wrong with Lisa. I stopped my truck along US 19 and got down on my knees and prayed that she was all right. She was not.
I have been praying every day, all day for my brother. He is not responding.
If anyone else tells me that again that God is calling them home. I will lose it.
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