The Devil You Know

Where do we feel comfortable and why?

“I can take your order here,” said a sweet voice from behind the counter. I looked up and a pretty girl with pale skin, rosy cheeks and brown curly hair smiled and beckoned me over. I had been struggling for a few minutes with the big touch-screen in front of me, partly because I was indecisive on what to order, and partly because, despite being born in the late 80s, inside I’m really a boomer that has a hard time interacting with technology from time to time.

I walked over and was about to tell her that since no one was behind the counter minutes ago, I didn’t mind ordering through the screen (although deep inside I did welcome the human interaction). She noticed my relief and proceeded to take my order with the best attitude I’ve ever received from a Zoomer in the service industry —or ever, period.

“I’m (definitely) not in Miami anymore,” I thought. I had just landed in a tiny airport in a southern state. I was in town for work for a few days and wanted to grab a quick lunch before heading to the office. That was my welcome, but it was not the only interaction where I felt the southern hospitality. My Uber driver, a man from Ghana who had been living there for about a decade, was chatty and charming. The lady who checked me into my hotel later that evening, originally from Cocoa Beach, bonded with me over the fact that we were both fellow Floridians and smiled a big smile, despite missing some teeth.

Every time I visit, everyone I encounter seems to go out of their way to be kind. They smile, say good morning or goodbye. It’s a refreshing contrast from the typical interactions in South Florida. Of course there are nice people where I live, but I guess Miami has fallen into the big-city trap that renders most people incompetent of small-town charm. Interactions are transactions —if you’re lucky. If you’re not, you may walk away feeling emotionally defeated or wondering if you did something wrong because the lady whom you asked what sauces were available with your order, gave you the stink eye and a big attitude before responding.

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But when I visit nice-town USA, I am also left with a feeling of ‘other’. Let me clarify: No one has ever made me feel this way there. It’s just a feeling that creeps up from within me when I go to a restaurant to have dinner by myself, or when I’m walking alone around the town’s square. “Where’s her husband?” I think the wives whisper to their husbands as they pass me by on the street or glance at me from the restaurant table near mine.

It’s easier to blend in in big cities where no one seems to question why someone’s alone (or so I think), but in this traditional town of beautiful houses with white picket fences and families with 2.4 kids and a dog, a woman eating dinner alone at a hot pot restaurant on a Wednesday night may raise some questions.

It’s all in my head! Maybe… but most of the people I’ve met there are still friends with their high school friends, were married before the age of 30, and have at least two kids. No that there is anything wrong with that. There’s a version of me, in a parallel universe, that thrived in a life like that; went to church every week, prepared dinner parties for her three best friends and their husbands, volunteered as chaperone in all kindergarten activities, booked girl weekends to take a break from the kids and husband but would spend the entire time talking about them.

There’s, yet, another version of me that moved to the South of France, broke all societal and familial patterns and became a published author. But this version of me lives in a domestic partnership and is in love with a man from a different generation and culture. This version has two college-age stepsons, does not want to get married, get a dog or have a kid. My idea of responsibility is not letting my plants die. My traditions are a combination of the culture I was raised in, the things I’ve learned from my travels around the world, and having a family that is very diverse; in ethnicity and thought.

If I were to move to this charming southern town tomorrow, I would stick out like a sore thumb. Locals would never see me in church on Sundays, for starters. They would realize I’d always skip the baby and pet food aisles in the supermarket. It wouldn’t take long before they’d find out I didn’t follow The Rules of Life. I imagine that if I managed to fit into a social circle, we would find each other fascinating for the first hour or so, but afterwards, we would probably question each other’s life choices and resort to just being nice again.

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There was a time when I wanted to leave Miami to never come back. Not because people weren’t nice, but because I thought I needed to find something better. I thought I needed to chase something, when in reality, I was just running from myself. After 25 years, and a sequence of great but unexpected choices, Miami has been the closest thing to permanence I’ve experienced. Call it the devil I know, but with all its good, its bad and its ugly, Miami has seen and accepted my good, my bad and my ugly —without questions.

I don’t second-guess my life choices. Deep down, I’ve always known tradition wasn’t for me, and I like love my life as it is. However, I’ve come to realize that any fear of being seen as unconventional—like when people ask why I don’t want children, and then insist motherhood is the best thing I could ever do—stems from worrying about others' perceptions, not from my own dissatisfaction with my life.

I realize I’m reducing this whole situation to geography. I’m making it seem like the “traditional” lifestyle is nothing but a judgy one, without any evidence that the people from the southern state even notice me or that Miami cares one bit about my life choices. So maybe that’s what I have to come to terms with; I don’t fit the mold and I’m fine with it, but will others be fine with me? I know the answer… “who cares what anyone else thinks!?” But if you’ve ever been in a similar position, isn’t it easier said than done?