Go South Young Man
I was floundering in 1986. I wasn’t going anywhere. I had a fairly decent job at an Auto Body shop in Fenton Michigan. It was 
a small shop without much business. I was still flipping cars on the side. I had cars that I bought and took them to the body shop to fix them up and sell them. Of course, I was trying to make it look like they were customers’ cars and not mine.
The District Manager came in one day and looked at the repair orders for a couple of the cars that were in the shop. He put two and two together and figured they were mine. He fired me on the spot. I deserved it!!
The lure of moving grew stronger as my parents kept tellin me to pack up and move to Florida. I just didn’t want to do it. I’m thinkin it was that fear of the unknown.
I knew what I had in Flint. I had good friends and roots. South Florida just didn’t sound good to me. But, I finally made the decision. It was tough. Really tough. I packed up my 1983 Buick Regal and rented a small little U-haul trailer for some of the bigger items that wouldn’t fit in the car. I said my goodbyes and on November 1, 1986, I got up early and hit US 23 southbound headed to south Florida.
I thought at first that I’d drive straight through which is about a 24-hour drive. When I hit the Atlanta area which is about halfway I could tell there was no way I’d be able to go straight through. I made it somewhere to the Macon area and was lucky to find a place to crash for the night. I got up around 9:00 the next morning and hit the road.
I ended up having a car problem (it was running too hot) after being on the road for about an hour. I was lucky enough to find a dealer that was open on a Sunday and got me hooked up with a transmission cooler. I pulled into my parent’s place around 10:30 PM which made it a long day.
The New Digs
I had a little one-bedroom apartment on Lyons Road in Pompano Beach. At the time the place was like new. I left an older home in Flint that needed work. This apartment didn’t need anything. I remember thinking, “Wow! This is my new place?” They had a swimming pool and everything.
I was in 7th heaven. Not to mention that here it was November and it felt like summer time in Flint. I was all about the weather and it wasn’t anything like I thought it was although it wasn’t the “Dog days” of summer either. Everything seemed new down there though whereas everything in Flint was old and dilapidated. I adjusted quickly.
Bocair County Club
My parents were big golfers and they got me hooked up at a posh country club up in Boca Raton with my first job there. I wasn’t a caddy, I was a “Bagger.” When all the rich golfers came to play they would ask one of us baggers to get their bags and put them on their golf cart. It didn’t pay a whole lot hourly, but we got tipped pretty well.
One day there were these two guys that just finished up. When they pulled up to where I was standing it looked like it was a father and son playing together. The older guy says to me, “Do you know who that is” pointing to his partner. I looked at him for a couple of seconds. “No idea.” The older guy showed me one of his golf balls.
It was a white golf ball but it had what looked like red stitching that was painted on the ball to make it look like a baseball. The older guy said, “That’s Jessie Orosco. I knew who he was (a major league baseball player). I found out later that the older guy was Bob Cousy who was a top professional basketball player back in the day.
Little New York
I had no real idea about what the culture was like down in South Florida. This is how naive I was when I moved down there: Since I was born and raised in Flint I just figured most everyone in South Florida was born and raised there. NOT! It seemed like Little New York down there.
There were a ton of Northeastern people down there and there were a ton of Jewish people there too. Unlike Flint which had very few Jewish people, South Florida had em lined up one after another. I was able to play my Jewish Card down there. LOL, Not that I was all of a sudden wearing a Yamaka and the Star of David around my neck I played that Jewish card a lot because I knew that it was great for building rapport and getting on common ground with other Jews.
Conclusion
For as apprehensive as I was to move to South Florida it didn’t take me very long to adapt. Even though I felt more comfortable down there being Jewish it didn’t help any with my belief in God. I remember having some conversations with some of my Jewish friends down there and it seemed like all but one believed in God. So we were on the same page there. LOL
