Up Up and Away! Style In the City Moves to the Beach

Photo by Susanne Seidman/Local Kicks Little Lilly, at one of her all-time Old Town favorites, Tickled Pink.

If you are like many American moms and dads standing at the brink of summer with the usual mix of excitement and weariness, you are not alone.  

For a couple of years, the summer blockbuster movie seemed almost retro if nonexistent.
 
Seeking a place to camp while my three times gotta be the charm open house passed, I ventured into stadium seating with my two minis.  
 
Hoping for a hit didn’t even cross my worn out mind. Instead I engaged in just a little silent prayer that we all relax in the cool and no one cry, scream, fall, throw up or cause another to cry, scream fall or throw up.

Unsure if a surly, overtired, nearly three-year old operating on the late to bed early to rise summer sunshine time clock could be counted upon to hold it together for a feature film, I stocked my bag with contraband candy and his drink of choice, a Horizon Vanilla milk box, and climbed upwards and inwards to take our seats.

Confident the movies could finally capture the growing imagination of my curious and smart six year old, I diligently pressed on dispensing popcorn into small cups to thwart the almost certain and unavoidable potential giant popcorn spill.  
 
The minis wiggled, fidgeted and settled into the enormous red seats. They looked so small to me again. The speakers boomed. I crossed my fingers for motion picture magic. Lights, camera, action.

Grossing over $68 million at the box office in 3 weeks, Disney Pixar’s latest masterpiece geared toward minis but with a multigenerational appeal, “Up” is capturing hearts young and old with its balloon filled fantasy. 

And why not? Who wouldn’t like to be transported from the drudgery of daily life in a bad economy to a magical adventure righting the wrongs of an unfulfilled dream. Transported we better feel after dropping about fifty bucks, for a family of four, in today’s high tech, high price movie theatre experience.

As the animated Campbell Soup Kiddish boy, Carl Friedricksen and wild haired, seemingly hair brained toothy girl, Ellie, stood in a dilapidated house on screen, I let myself travel back in time, just enough, to my own days of summer and girlish pursuits, feeling my adult defenses soften and my cynical disbelief crack enough to let in the possibility.  
 
My minis' eyes widened at the mention of adventure by the narrator.  Surprisingly, mine simultaneously filled with tears.  

Watching the silent boy and bold girl (yes it took me a minute to catch on to her gender) meet, befriend, fall in love, accept the impossibility of children, save, set aside dreams for car repairs and roof repairs, grow old together formed a lump in my throat that migrated to my stomach and settled there.

When the still silent but now old man found himself letting go of his true love and partner in adventure without realizing their dream, the tears streamed down my newly sun kissed cheeks. Tears of joy, relief, and sadness brought to the surface all in a matter of mere seconds, and the movie had barely begun.
 
What would my life story in short be?

Over the course of the picture, I watched the darling and well executed plot wondering if the lessons it could teach were sinking into the spongy minds of my minis.  
 
After all, they have a lot on their own little noggins these early days of summer. School is wrapping up and with that end, a move is on the horizon.  One they can only understand in simple terms. A complicated move but one that has an ultimately simple purpose, a dream of underlying sunny, salty, breezy happiness.

This move is meant to bring adventure; an adventure to realize a dream, a dream to keep me from growing old only to unsatisfied that the dream slipped away, like the old Carl in the movie. I could relate to his plight. Can’t we all?
 
Watching the world dwarf the sum total of his dream, his wife gone, his happy house in jeopardy, his falls never laid eyes on, I felt confident in my choice to prevent my potential from being unrealized creating a tiny, unchanging, could have/should have existence.

Equally important, he didn’t get to share his dream’s fulfillment with his true love.

In my adventure dream, there is no “great falls,” but the impossibility and immediacy seemed as unrealistic to some observers as moving a house with helium balloons to South America.
 
In reality, this move realizes a dream to live close to the beauty and power of the ocean on a sunny island, one with a gravitational pull to my dreams as strong as the tide in a full moon. A chance to create with words, music and a sunset happy ending.

Similar to “Up,” the plot of my move story line includes human drama on mini and adult levels. With an adventurous spirit, we all say goodbye to Alexandria and hello to Florida.

Good bye colonial townhouse. You were solid and roomy. But your 1983 construction lacked the charm I coveted in other Alexandria homes.  Your location, while convenient, didn’t make me race back to you at the end of a long day to find solace or at the end of a journey to sigh, “Welcome Home.”

Hello little, yellow wooden cottage a stones' throw from the beach. You may be one half the size, but when I cross over your threshold, I breathe a sigh of ocean relief, “home at last.”

Good bye Old Town. We’ve sure have had some good times.  

Austin Grill, you’re a chip off the old queso cheese block.  We’ll always have that 30th birthday at the bar with Orlando eating fondant cake from Alexandria Pastry Shop while toasting with a Cadillac.
 
I’ll think of you with each margarita I sip at Rocco’s Tacos in Palm Beach, especially as I mark my next major birthday this summer.  Rock It Grill, I’ll be taking my act on the road to Pirate’s Loft, The Refuge, Fins and the Wave.

See ya waterfront ducks. Be grateful to count yourselves amongst the best fed animals from coast to coast. It has been our pleasure, but, I see sea gulls and pelicans in my bread line now. I need waves and sand to sink my toes into on a lazy afternoon.

Hello little barrier island. I want to be as happy at home as I am on vacation.

Good bye Tickled Pink, our favorite boutique. OK, you are already gone, as is the cash and time happily spent in those muraled dressing rooms.   
 
Remember little Lilly, all of three years insisting on a visit immediately after her first day of school to pop out of the froggy dressing room and show off her dress and backpack at “her store?”
 
Hysteria, The Shoe Hive, Monday’s Child we’ll see you for visits. I promise.  
 
Cross my credit card, I mean heart. C. Orrico, expect to see us regularly on that comfy rattan couch, including off season, in season and holidays.
 
Lilly Pulitzer in Palm Beach Gardens Mall, we’ll be regulars and after the spread at the grand opening day, the minis will be confused at a lack of free flowing, pink cupcakes.
 
Hope that swing in the monkey mural dressing room is sturdy, too.  I can’t wait until Lilly Pulitzer and Lilly Seidman cross paths. We will all need a pink cocktail, or twelve. Good news is we will be able to skip ab workouts for at least a week.

Good bye seasonal allergies. Road rage, you’re likely to be merely a seasonal condition now.

While I’ll be kickin it locally in the Palm Beach area, I’ll keep my toes dipped in Potomac waters for an occasional feature on LocalKicks.com.

Cheers to summer and a lifetime full of adventures, my stylish readers! Onwards and upwards. Whether at the beach or the box office, stay savvy in the city and chic on the island.

Continue to reach the writer,Susanne Seidman at Susanne.Seidman@gmail.com
 
Editor's Note: From all of us at Local Kicks, Congrats on your move and Happy Landings to our fearless Style in the City Columnist, ceaseless raconteur and spirit of life comrade who breathed new energy into the webzine with your boundless joie de vivre and unmistakably cool writing style. We bid adieu for now.