Audio Version

Between 1977 and 1988 we would spend the Christmas Holidays in my in-law’s condominium in West Palm Beach.

As the map shows, Century Village is located on the East side of the Florida Turnpike and is bounded by Okeechobee Boulevard and Haverhill Road.

Century Village, as the name implies, is a development for seniors. It’s the place where New Year’s Eve parties would end at 11pm and the flavor of the month at Baskin-Robbin’s on the south-east corner of Okeechobee and Haverhill was Metamucil. I used to joke that when we arrived the average age dropped to 65.

Have you ever noticed that the older and more frail seniors get, the bigger their cars? There were many times when we thought there was no one driving. The car appeared to be traveling on its own. As the car passed by us, we could see white knuckles grasping the steering wheel and a senior peering nervously through their cataract spectacles over the top of the wheel. Scared the hell out of us.

It’s no joke when I tell you that every day, we would see collision debris in the middle of the intersection of Haverhill and Okeechobee. (The red dot on the map.) Bits of body side mouldings, mufflers, side mirrors, headlamps, hub caps. You could start a second-hand parts business from the debris alone…

Century Village had a rigid security protocol. All the visiting guests had to have id cards and display them to the guard at the gate when entering. Very secure, except that the guards were all old geezers with cataract lenses and poor vision.

There were two entrances to the Village. One from Haverhill and one from Okeechobee. We tended to use the Haverhill entrance.

One day we were returning from a trip to the mall. I drove up to the gate and realized I didn’t have my id with me. So, I held up my driver’s licence and the guard came out, squinted, and let us through. So much for id’s I thought. I began to wonder just how secure we really were.

I will have to test the security. Thus, began the challenge to see what would be the most outrageous thing we could show to the guard and still get in. I was 36, going on 12.

The next thing we tried was a playing card. I held up the King of Hearts and we sailed through.

Then I tried a tuna salad sandwich, in its packaging, of course. I pointed the sandwich, with the label showing, towards the guard, and we sailed in again. This is crazy! This is too easy.

So, I went for broke. The next time we went through, I held up Adam’s bare foot. Adam was 4 or 5 at the time. Again, the guard came out, squinted, and again we sailed through. This is ridiculous. Every day we heard stories about seniors getting mugged, some in the village and some in the neighboring malls.

The night of the foot episode I started laughing so hard at the craziness of the system that I almost passed out. My kids still remember me gasping for breath as I recounted, in my mind, the day’s event.

From December on it was quite usual for people in London, Ontario to greet us with “Have you got all your Christmas shopping done yet?” I would politely explain that we are Jewish, we don’t celebrate Christmas, we celebrate Boxing Day, when everything’s on sale. So, while Boxing Day doesn’t exist in the States, after Christmas Day sales are rampant. It’s the perfect day to buy toys. Toys without boxes, toys with parts missing, toys, toys, toys. It was the day when we would get into the car and head for the WPB malls. We had money and we were after bargains, bargoons even, cheap, unpackaged, even dented toys. After all, how long do toys last anyway before they’re dented or broken? Toys that were $10 the day before Christmas were now as low as 25cents.

Summer clothing for the kids and even us was so cheap after Christmas.

At this point, you’re probably wondering how we got all our bargains home to London. Well, Adam and I would usually drive down. We would make the drive part of our holiday. We would drive for a few hours and then stay at a Holiday Inn holidome. Holidomes are indoor water parks.

We would do the same on our way back. Meanwhile Karen and Jenny would fly home. Saved us paying for a rental car and Adam and I would have fun.