We had a plan with lots of moving parts, so there was much potential for things to go wrong. We had 4 groups of people, each group renting a 3 wheeled vehicle. Most of our group was interested in the slingshot, with 2 wheels in the front and 1 in the back. You may have seen them, in bright colors or looking like the Batmobile. My spouse and I wanted to try a trike, with 2 wheels in the back and 1 in the front. We were renting 4 vehicles from 4 different places, heading to my brother-in-law's house in Homestead, and taking a cruise to the Keys. It was Valentine's Day, but we hoped that if we showed up at one of our favorite restaurants in the middle of the afternoon, we might be able to get a table in the open air near the water. I hoped for social distancing but felt a bit worried about safety.
Three of our group assembled at our house to ride to Homestead together. And then--the orange slingshot didn't start. We thought maybe it was a dead battery. Three of us pushed the slingshot, with one person steering, and it started. But then it stopped again.
We repeated this process several times, hoping against hope that it was a simple dead battery, that if we could just get it running, we could recharge that battery. Since that didn't work, we deduced it was an alternator or worse. We called my brother-in-law in Homestead and had them head to us in their slingshot.
The owner of the slingshot came to try to charge the battery--over and over, he tried to charge the battery. It didn't work, of course. We moved the dead slingshot out of the driveway.
We spent a lot of Valentine's Day pushing vehicles. When I thought of all the ways we might regain our youth, pushing dead vehicles with dead batteries is not one of the scenarios I was dreaming of.
We were heading to the middle of the afternoon, still not having gone very far, still not having eaten. We thought of various places to eat, both north and south, and made phone calls to restaurants who very politely did not laugh at us when we asked if it was possible to get a table.
We started calling restaurants further inland who didn't have a water view, but did have outside seating. And finally, success! Off we went to the Chimney House, which is near the Broward Center for the Performing Arts in downtown Ft. Lauderdale. For our whole table, I ordered a pitcher of Sangria made with white wine--delicious! I thoroughly enjoyed my meal: skirt steak with an amazing chimichurri sauce--I expect to reek of garlic for days. The restaurant was fairly empty, another bonus in these days of pandemic.
We came back and there was discussion about how to spend the rest of our time with our rented 3 wheeled vehicles. My brother-in-law needed to return his before 7, so off he went back to Homestead. The younger folks in our set went off into the post sunset to enjoy nightlife with a slingshot.
My spouse and I sat on our front porch, discussing what to do. We could do a short ride south and enjoy the high-rise lights. We could head further, to the Keys. In the end, when asked how he wanted to spend the evening, he said, "Like this." He was serious: a lovely breeze, twinkling lights in the rosemary trees, a cigar and a drink, and time together. It's a sweet sentiment for Valentine's Day. Time zooms by, and it's hard to know how to spend it best:
We may go for a sunrise ride before it's time to return the bike. Or perhaps not.
It's not the way I thought our Valentine's Day would go--it's not what any of us planned. But my hope is that when we look back, we'll be happy with the way we made the best of it.
And it could have been worse. At least the slingshot died outside of our house. It could have been otherwise: in the Keys, by the side of the turnpike--or worse, in a far lane of the turnpike. It could have been even worse--but it wasn't.
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