Written May 2017 - Asheville, North Carolina
I G O R, F L is a place I thought I would hate.
I G O R, F L is a place I thought I would hate.
I did hate it.
The crowd I was with could have been a part of that sensation. I was driving a load of British and Scottish camp counselors around Florida and I was grumpy, sick – and even more sick of driving. I had spent an afternoon at the Tampa Aquarium, staring mindlessly into tanks and sidestepping around many erratic children.
“Igor is a MUST SEE,” my friend Kat said.
I had torn myself away from Jellyfish and Stingrays for Igor. I had once again braved the onslaught of Tampa’s rush hour traffic for Igor. I was enduring the incessant whining of French pop music for Igor.
And we finally got there, and . . .
What a disappointment.
The cobblestones did not make this town feel quaint and historic – no. It felt trapped, suffocated by the past. Some type of Eastern European music trailed out of tin speakers as we trudged down the sidewalks searching for the rest of our crew.
Bars on windows added to the oppressive feel. Most buildings stood abandoned. Rusty fire escapes hung low over the sidewalks, making the streets feel like cages. What was most distressing, however, was the people of Igor. They were few and far between, as most of the people walking these streets were decidedly not natives – women in heels clinging to the arms of their dinner dates, teens running in packs with their polaroids, tiny groups of middle-aged women pointing at falling down storefronts and frowning – these were not the people of Igor. These were the tourists of Igor, which for a few brief minutes, was a club I was a part of.
No – the people of Igor were distinct. I saw them sitting on the tops of fire escapes, shopping in the corner markets and the curb shops, working behind the counters at the dark and dingy bars. An elderly man limped by us on our promenade down main street – pushing a baby in a faded red stroller – a baby not more than two months old, wrapped in a large t-shirt and loosely bouncing back and forth in her grubby chariot, her head heavily dangling on the top of her tiny body, her eyes open and wandering.
I felt sick to my stomach as the old man continued on past us. There were a million questions present in my mind, but I felt I had no right to ask them, and so I silenced my discomfort and followed my group up to the edge of a tattoo parlor, stinging my eyes with all its neon signs, where the rest of our friends were waiting for us in a cloud of excited conversation.
“Let’s get our ears pierced like Kat has hers done!” One of the Irish girls yelled.
Somehow, with the town decaying around us, and my spirits deteriorating even faster, I agreed. We all crammed into the parlor. I paid my bill before taking a seat in the chair; unsure of what to tip for services I had not yet received.
The needle was large and dull and I watched in wide-eyed horror in the mirror as it dove into my sunburnt earlobe and the blood slowly pooled. I thought my small silver hoop was beautiful, but the hole got infected and ached for weeks and weeks, burning hotly through the rest of our Florida nights, keeping me awake and tossing irritably between the dull bodies of my sleeping companions.
Eventually, I took it out, but still to this day there is a miserable little lump in my ear, and when I feel my broken cartilage I think, “Igor! What a terrible place.”
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