Someone is playing basketball...

December 2004
Just after Christmas A and I flew to Miami and drove down to the Keys. We rented a condo about 20 miles north of Key West. We had stayed there before; a gated senior citizen community with a security guard at the gate and another patrolling on a golf cart. The seniors got together every evening for an activity like bingo, line dancing or karaoke; white haired grandmas in metallic gold crooning to Patsy Cline and suave grandpas in bermuda shorts, socks and sandals swaying with their lady to Hank Williams. Several days a week at 6am, they cruised around on the golf cart with a megaphone inviting everyone to join the pancake breakfast; only $2, all you could eat. Quiet time at 10pm was strictly enforced as well as pool and hot tub time. See what a wild partying couple we are. We actually didn't care-we were only at the condo to sleep. We spent the most of our time on the beach or Duval Street.

New Year's Eve we spent in Key West and what a wild party that was. Duval Street was so packed we could hardly move through the crowd and we welcomed 2005 with the dropping of the drag queen and a big kiss.

I'm sure the party continued all night but after making out in the car for awhile, we wanted to get back to our condo for our own New Years celebration and hitting the beach early in the morning is always a priority.  Somewhere around 3am I was just drifting off into that hazy dreamy sleep. I could hear a pounding-like the sound of a basketball being dribbled in a gymnasium; that resonating echo.

A nudges me; "Hey, do you hear that?"
I'm bothered by her and mutter; "What?! That's just someone playing basketball." I pull the covers over my head.
A throws the covers back and sits up in bed; "That's not someone playing basketball. That's fucking! I know what fucking sounds like and that's fucking!"

I think we were both up in a flash and to the window, opening it and peering out trying to figure out where the noise is coming from. It sounded like it could have been in the same room with us. By now I had realized beyond a doubt it was indeed fucking and VERY loud fucking at that. A points at the house behind us; "It can't possibly be them. I didn't think that old man had it in him." (The morning before we had watched him tooling around with his walker when the medical supply truck had come to deliver his oxygen tanks.)
I'm pointing next door; "No, no it's over there."

By this time the banging is increasing, the woman is screaming and he is grunting with everything he has. The sound echos through the entire area and I was sure the bed was going to come out through the side of the building. A yells out the window; "Give it to her!!" I doubt they could have heard us with all the ruckus they were making. The banging, screaming and grunting crescendos to the finale and then there was silence. A calls out the window; "Good job buddy! I couldn't have done it better myself!" Then slammed the window shut and crawled back into bed. The next morning we were up early to try to catch a glimpse of the lovebirds but they had already left. I didn't hear or see anything, but I kind of wonder if the grandpa on the golf cart with the megaphone threw them out for violating the 10pm quiet time. We've always wondered.