THEY TOOK OUR BREATH AWAY

         In my last entry I wrote about a photograph of palm trees swaying by the bay.   To me they symbolize what we've lost in Coconut Grove.

   As you see above, I found them again last week.

  We were invited to a pool party at an Italian villa on Main Highway, "El Jardin". 

Built in 1917, it is now the Carrolton School of the Sacred Heart.

   As we sat in the grass I glanced to my left. 

In the distance was something exhilarating, like finding something you had spent years searching for.

                            Two hundred yards east I could see  coconut trees by the bay once more. We dashed off to greet them.
 
 As they framed the sparkling bay, fishermen optimistically cast their lines.


To the north, downtown Miami poked past the horizon.

  For a moment all was good.  I got to see what had drawn us to the Grove long ago.




   
                   

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  LAST NIGHT'S VILLAGE COUNCIL MEETING

   Yesterday a friend called to tell me the Grove's village council was discussing the Grove Bay proposal at the sailing club.
    Francesca and I drove over to hear the debate.  There wasn't any.  For fifty minutes we heard city officials drone on about how great the Grove's own "Bayside" will be.
   Finally, the audience was allowed to ask "short questions".  My mind bursting at the seams, I stood and told the three suits, "What you are proposing is awful. Your development will hurt local businesses, demolish Scotty's, and the reasons we love Coconut Grove"...
   I went on for five emotional minutes with
council members yelling, "You are out of order!" .    I was.  So what? 
    The developer's speil was suffocating. Every now and you gotta come up for air.

(I later learned the Grove Village Council, the group that purports to represent what's best for our village, approved the Grove Bay plan two months ago.)