Very civil servants and air conditioners

I don't know if it's a sign of the times, or if over the years I was living outside Florida something changed, but whatever ...

When I came back to Florida in 1979 after living in Israel for four years I was greeted with generally surly government clerks.

Not all were uncivil servants - I remember fondly the Customs people at Miami International and a local officer who exercised some discretion for a very minor infraction - but dealing with county personnel was a challenge. (A move to Florida's west coast proved to me that lack of civility was limited to a few southeast coast counties.)

Jump to 2009 - 30 years later - and as I deal with tax assessors, get vehicles registered - not a one-step process, get a Florida driver's license, and the usual municipality odds and ends I find the local civil servants truly civil.

Florida has what amounts to a $100-per-vehicle impact fee for first time residents. We lived here before and the State's vehicle registration database found us - for a $200 savings. We knew to ask the clerk to check because the receptionist/information person told us to ask. The clerk who did find us in the database was not only efficient but kind as well.

This repeated itself at the drivers' license office. My license was reinstated after an eye test. "Welcome back, Mr. Glenn."

Filing for the tax exemption likewise was, if not "enjoyable," at least comfortable. (If only parking was validated. Oh well.) Since I forgot to register to vote when getting my new license, the clerk sent me down the hall to register. The alternative was a $15 penalty, but since I wanted to register anyway, "not a problem." The woman who registered me was delightful. (OK, it was not a day of long lines, but credit where it's due.)

That's not to say settling in has been hiccup free, but for the most part, things have gone much better than my previous experience in southeast Florida would have given me to expect.

I don't know what promoted the change of attitude, but it is more than welcome.

It's good to be "home" - even I am only a "semi-native" and even if the "feels like" temperature was a bit above 100 the other day.

 

What's happened to us?

I was looking at my old junior high's Web page - now Kinloch Park Middle - and noted that it got air conditioning in 1975 - long after I went there.

My high school - Miami High - was no different. No air conditioning in my day. I don't know when the "Million Dollar" (in 1928 dollars) school finally was air conditioned.

When I was a young airman stationed in Orlando (1360 USAF Hospital, if you please) I would drive to southeast Florida in a clunker that had 4-40 air conditioning: four windows cranked down and 40 miles-an-hour. The biggest hazard to lack of AC was sticking my left arm out the open window and getting a nasty sunburn (a courts martial offense if I was unable to report to duty - I always reported for duty).

Maybe the novelty will soon wear off, but as long as the rain holds off, I still like to turn the AC off and drive with the windows down - no "rolling," they're electric now. Not at highway speeds; that adds mileage-dropping drag, but around the neighborhood, even if the "feels like" is 40 ... Centigrade. 'Course this is written by a guy who walks around Bet Shean in the heat of a summer day - "mad dogs and Englishmen" comes to mind.

For all that, I can't understand how some people accommodate the heat - or maybe "accommodateD" the heat - while others suffer loudly, sometimes VERY loudly. Maybe "back in the day" we simply didn't know we were uncomfortable.

If my abode had hurricane awnings (vs. the very nice slide-into-place window covers) I'd probably shut off the AC, open the windows, and turn on a fan even as the rains came down. No I wouldn't - my Spouse would never approve. But if I could ...

Yohanon
Yohanon.Glenn @ gmail.com