An Englishman in Ft Lauderdale, by Clayton Littlewood

At the age of 71, Quentin Crisp - writer, raconteur and habitué of London’s Soho - moved to the US. On his arrival he remarked, "I look forward to receiving my naturalization papers so that I can commit a crime and not be deported." And so, he became, thanks to Mr. Sting, ‘An Englishman in New York.’
At the age of 55, I also left the slightly seedy and darkest Soho, and moved to the US, and I became ‘An Englishman in Fort Lauder dale’, although the only crime I have committed so far has been holding up traffic, not realizing you can turn right when the traffic light is on red.
I’d visited the US many times before over the years. I remember my first trip. It was in the early 90s. I walked out of New York’s coach station and gazed up in awe. The buildings were so tall they appeared to pierce the ozone layer. Then I ran toward a taxi, petrified that I was about to be mugged (I’d been watching a lot of Cagney and Lacey back then).
‘Could you take me to the YMCA on West 63rd Street please?’ I asked the driver, breathlessly.
He stared at me. ‘What part of Australia are ya’ from?’
I get that a lot here. For some reason Americans assume my accent is either Australian, South African or Canadian. When I apologize and tell them, with downcast eyes, I’m British, invariably they’ll say, ‘Oh! You’re a Brit. Do you know my friend Mike?’ So rather than let them down (again), I’ll reply, ‘Yes. What a lovely man. He said to say ‘hello’.’ Should the conversation proceed it’s usually followed by questions such as, ‘Do you like Benny Hill?’ Or, ‘Who do you think killed Princess Di?’ These are difficult to answer. Firstly, because chasing women with big breasts has never been my ‘thing’. Secondly, I don’t wish to implicate myself should the investigation be reopened.
But, despite being thought of as Australian, or a breast connoisseur, what I do like about living in Fort Lauder dale are the people. They are so friendly. In central London, you can be living at the same address since God was a lad, and never meet (or want to meet) your neighbors. If you venture onto the ‘tube’ (the underground train), it is almost an arrest able offense to make eye contact with your fellow passengers. I was once cruised by a woman sitting opposite me who was wolfing down an onion bagel. It wasn’t the smell I found disturbing;it was the eye contact. Us Londoners are a shy, tight lipped, frigid lot, not very welcoming. Not until we’ve had a couple of glasses of sweet sherry, that is.
Here in downtown Fort Lauder dale, it’s different. My first week in town, I was walking along the neighborhood and a man passed by and said, ‘Hello, how are you today?’ I was about to say, ‘I’m sorry. I don’t have any money on me. Just credit cards. But would you like me to buy you an egg and cress sandwich?’ Then it hit me. He wasn’t homeless. Or crazy. He was just being friendly. That’s what I like about living here. Although it’s a city, it has a small-town charm. In London, if you live in the West and you want to visit friends in the East, by the time you’ve left work, in the dark, emerging from a packed tube, days later, bruised, battered, perhaps with a broken limb or two, the thought of going back out in the evening, traveling another hour to get from one side of the city to the other, it’s too much to bear. In Fort Lauder dale, the friends I’ve made live close by. Just a few minutes’ drive. It makes sustaining friendships much easier.
Still, driving on the other side of the road has been a problem. Why can’t the world adopt a single format, like Celsius instead of Fahrenheit?Aubergine instead of eggplant? And, don't even get me started on the metric system. For me, learning to drive on the right, with the steering wheel on the left, with no gear stick, attempting these things called ‘U Turns’, well … I’ve lived here a year now and residents will be pleased to know I’ve gone from one crash a month, to one every three. Although when I tell friends I’m going to put ‘petrol’ in my car, they look at me as if I’m something they found stuck to the bottom of their flip-flop. ‘It’s not petrol,’ they tell me. ‘It’s ‘gas’.’ I assumed that’s what you emit after a large bowl of black bean soup.
Should I manage to arrive at a friend’s house (without crashing) I’ve discovered that whereas in London we host dinner parties, here it’s ‘pool parties.’ I’ve also discovered it’s advisable to find out what the dress code is beforehand, as I once turned up to a pool party in a sports jacket and matching trousers, clutching a bottle of Pinot Noir and a rather fetching swimming costume, and I was greeted at the door by the host wearing nothing but high factor sunscreen.
There are some aspects of my old life I would like to retain, however. Dinner parties are one. I like the table set, with place mats, with proper table-setting etiquette. I was once having lunch with a friend here and she stared at my fork. ‘Why do you hold it upside down like that?’ she asked. ‘Because it’s not a shovel,’ I replied. I immediately apologized. There are some aspects of your childhood upbringing that you never quite let go of, even if they are a bit ‘Downtown Abbeyish’.
Food here has also taken some getting used to. As well as the portion sizes, I remember as a child being horrified that Americans served pancakes, fruit, maple syrup, and bacon, all on one plate. Sweet and savory, together? It seemed sacrilegious. And don’t get me started on grits. It’s like eating wallpaper paste. Although, I must admit, the same could be said about porridge. One friend remarked, ‘Even the name sounds disgusting.’ It’s true. And it does summon up an image of Oliver Twist and his begging bowl.
Arranging to meet friends can also be problematic as Florida appears to have its own time measurement. Arriving at a bar, ten minutes before the agreed meeting time, can mean waiting for up to an hour while you sip your coconut mojito, until your friends eventually waltz in, seemingly unconcerned. I’ve been told this is known as ‘Florida time’. In London, every minute is accounted for. Each one is precious, treated as if it’s your last. Here in Florida, the pace of life is much slower. You’re unlikely to die of a heart attack due to the rat race. More, clogged arteries and an inactive heart. I kind of like that. A typical day (if your semi-retired like me) involves laying on the beach, breathing, occasionally blinking and, if you get a sudden burst of energy, taking a selfie of your foot pointing toward the sea.
In Fort Lauder dale you’ll most likely see the same faces everywhere in town, in restaurants, in bars, at the grocery store. The plus side to this is, everyone knows everyone. Making friends is easy. In London, after ten years, you may move from being an ‘associate’ to a ‘friend’. Here, it happens in ten minutes. It’s not unusual for someone to share intimate details of their life, from relationship breakups and divorce settlements, to botched plastic surgery operations, before they’ve even told you their name.
And then, of course, there’s the weather. As part of my Resident Green Card process, I had to undergo a health check. After prodding and poking, and examining my body fluids, the doctor said gravely, as if about to impart news about an incurable disease, ‘Well Mr. Little wood, I’m afraid you appear to be low in Vitamin D.’ What did he expect? I was living in London. You get up in the dark. You go home in the dark. And you only witness a faint glimpse of sun on the last day of Wimbledon.
In Florida the sun beats down from morning until Happy Hour. For an Englishman like myself, it means my skin tone has moved from anemic to egg shell white. I look almost healthy. Although I was once stopped on the street by a man who said, ‘Have you ever thought of entering the Key West Ernest Hemingway lookalike competition?’ When I asked him which Hemingway he meant, the older version or the younger one, he replied, in all seriousness, ‘Definitely the older. When he was severely depressed. Just before he shot himself.’