I moved to Saint John after spending nearly ten years in Colorful Colorado, as many of you already know. A number of you who either vacation on, or have lived on, “the rock” know that it is a requirement of service industry employees to tell the story of who we are, where we came from and how we wound up in paradise.
In a typical evening, during wine service, I will ask the question, “Where ya’ll from?” to break the silence as I present and open a bottle. It directly leads to 20 questions about where I came from and how I uprooted from Ohio and, ten years later via Colorado, landed in the middle of the ocean. I don’t mind telling my story, EVER. I enjoy sharing my story of misfortune that lead me to where I am now. I also understand that people who are vacationing are often baffled at how someone could wind up living in a place so beautiful and so remote…If you don’t like sharing your story, don’t work in the front of the house in a restaurant in an amazing vacation destination. Better yet, don’t go to happy hour or the beach either; someone is bound to ask eventually how you got there.
Usually, the first 30 seconds of my interview goes like this:
Me: “Where ya’ll from.”
Guest: Dallas, Boston, New York, Greensboro, San Diego, etc.
Me: Insert some kind of comment relating to said city (I worked a ski expo there once, I have a childhood friend that moved there, etc.)
Guest: “Where did you come from?”
Me: “I spent eight years in Colorado before moving here.”
Guest: (Nine times out of Ten, unless they are also from Colorado or have frequently vacationed there themselves.) “Wow, that’s a real change for you.”
Generally, this comment is also followed by something about how they have met a lot of Colorado transplants on the rock. I would agree, there are a few of us.
Now, I just want to stop for a moment and say that I am not, BY ANY MEANS, making fun of someone for this response. At first glimpse, Colorado is cold, and St. John is definitely not. Colorado is known for snow and skiing and, well, there’s not much of either of those things on STJ. Many people ask me if I traded my snow skis for water skis and I reply, “Ski Bum to Beach Bum.” When you can do it all, why wouldn’t you?
I thought for a long while about this disassociation people make between Colorado and Saint John and, well, I actually came to the conclusion that, aside from the climate, the two places are very similar. A large number of vibrant, young people with a lust for life and adventure flock to both destinations in order to set up shop in a beautiful place and enjoy the readily accessible outdoors, make a good living with easy hours, stay out late, wake up early and build a new life from the ground up.
When you meet someone in Colorado, you immediately ask them where they are from…Not many people are actually FROM Colorado. Same with STJ…I can count on two hands how many people I have met who are born and raised on island. Therefore, the phrases, “Where are you really from?” and “No one is FROM here,” ring true in both places, and, when you have a majority of people who have migrated to a place by choice, but not by necessity, you find a happier breed of humanity.
The majority of the transplants in both places spend a lot of time supporting their local establishments, er, uh, watering holes. Due to our rambling tendencies and our ineffaceable pull in the direction of bar and restaurant work, many of us are, sometimes to a fault, VERY socially inclined. Therefore, we get done with a busy night at work…Are we going to go home and relax? Probably not. Are we going to wander into town to see who’s around, what the antics of the past 24 hours entail and wind up sitting at a bar, laughing hysterically at nothing until we need to be “evac’d” home? Most likely. This also applies to the daytime transplant workers in both arenas. I have never known anyone in my life that abuses happy hour privileges more than folks living on Saint John, and in Colorado.
The biggest similarity? Playing outside. I promised myself that when I moved to Colorado, and again when I moved to STJ, that I would never not take advantage of the gifts of Mother Nature right outside my doorstep. Both places have amazing hiking trails and constant sunshine. A lot of people don’t realize that Colorado gets 300 plus days of sunshine a year. Saint John probably does one better than that, but all in all, both places are high in the daily dose of Vitamin D and lend to both a happier and a more active existence.
There is, I suppose, a slight difference in the predominant extracurricular activities of the beaches of Saint John and the mountains of Colorado. Skiing is very different than snorkeling….or is it? Yes, yes, I suppose that speeding down the side of a mountain at knot speed wearing more clothing than I keep in my Cruz Bay closet with numb fingers and ice particles ripping through your cheeks could be quite a lot on the opposite end of the spectrum from sauntering to the beach in flops and a bathing suit, slipping your one piece of gear onto your head and immersing in a warm underwater world for hours on end. I guess they’re not at all the same. Or are they?
Riddle me this. When you get off of the mountain, or out of the water, after a few hours of subconsciously working your body on overhaul, what do you want? Me? I want a bacon cheeseburger and a beer…And I want them now. I realized a few weeks ago after a particularly lengthy swim at Jumbie that water and snow sports are the only physical activities that make me CRAVE calories. I run, I hike, I do yoga…I don’t want a heavy meal after any of these things. But, put me in the water or on the mountain enjoying myself in the sunshine for hours, and I go straight into fat kid mode.
Sunscreen is a necessity in both skiing and snorkeling, but you never remember that until after the fact. How many times have you taken your goggles off and realized you would be rocking a pretty raging set of raccoon eyes for the better part of the next week? With snorkeling, chances are you put sunscreen on your face, but the upper part of your back, which is exposed the entire time, remains neglected until you coat it with aloe hours later.
Both go better with drinks. A nice mimosa, or three, is a great way to boost your confidence, therefore also your speed and agility, both in the big blue and on the big white. During the experience, a pull of whiskey in Colorado is necessary to keep you warm from the inside on the icy slopes and a pull of rum in the Caribbean because, well, that’s just how we do. To round this out, you’re lying if you say you don’t enjoy going to happy hour in your ski gear or in your bathing suit.
Skiing and snorkeling are both great bonding experiences with a small group of friends and a pain in the ass for a large group of people. Admittedly, it is easier to “herd kittens” in the water than it is on the mountain, but rounding up a group of five people or more to do any kind of outdoor activity with both a start and an end point is no fun. Pointedly, skiing is much worse due to the fact that there is a start and an end point at the beginning and the end of every run. I’ll meet you on the beach and I’ll meet you at the lodge are two phrases with different intention, but parallel meanings.
In a nutshell, I had no idea that moving two time zones (three when daylight savings time is enacted) and several thousand miles from my home in landlocked Colorado to a small green dot in the middle of the ocean would equate to such a similar experience. Granted there are MANY things that are VERY different between the two places, but to me, they are both home to amazing people, Mother Nature at her finest and some of the most wonderful memories I continue to create every day.
wherethebreezesblow 