Exploring Florida: Three Sisters (and Two Cousins)

Cities as siblings.

In the three years now that Jen and I have lived in Tampa, I’ve struggled to understand and define its relationship with the adjacent cities of St. Petersburg and Clearwater. My latest attempt at comprehension entails putting it into a familial context, as three sisters.

Tampa is the oldest, and most grounded. A bit of a cigar-smoking tomboy who grew up playing with trucks and frequenting strip joints with pirates, she’s turned out to be resourceful, reliable and resilient, even if she’s never quite been able to get that old criminal record expunged entirely. She’s got intelligence of the practical, actionable type. Even if she’s not most stunningly beautiful of the three, she is unquestionably the one you will call when your car breaks down. Or if, late at night, you find yourself needing to dispose of a body.

St. Petersburg is the middle sister that left home to get an education – specifically an undergraduate degree in musical theater, a Masters in Fine Art and most of a Ph.D. in Religious Studies (one of these days she'll finish that doctoral thesis on how geographic location and topography impact belief systems). You want to talk abstract art, literature, punk rock, craft beer, famous muralists or pretty much anything culturally significant, she’s your gal. The downside? Predictably, she’s got a bit of a thing for hipsters.

That makes Clearwater, city of star worshipers (of which the sun in our own solar system is just one popular option), the youngest. The prettiest of the three, but also the flightiest. Last week she was into astrology, phrenology and tarot, before that it was numerology, and as we speak she’s out on the beach with a metal detector looking for buried treasure. Not that there’s anything wrong with any of that, but just keep in mind that if you're joining her for dinner or drinks be prepared to have your birth constellation charted in detail.

The analogy could end there, but let’s extend it to include the Broadway cousin, Orlando/Celebration. She’s kind of a big deal these days and getting bigger all the time. It might be due to her insatiable appetite - after consuming both the Marvel and Lucas universes, she’s still hungry. As she expands, day by day, mile by mile, she’s getting closer and closer to her cousins until eventually, one assumes, she’ll be living right next door. 

There's also the quiet, understated cousin to the south, Sarasota. She ran off to join the circus as at a young age but has since become surprisingly sophisticated. Quiet but articulate, when she speaks it's more because she has something to say than to hear her own voice. You've got to scratch the surface to get to know her, but it's worth the effort.