Sinks and toilets being what they were in the middle of the last century—specifically, heavy leaden tubs into which corpulent homeowners flushed gristle and maxi pads with alacrity—George Floyd eventually exhausted his professional prospects in Pearl River, New York. With dreams of condo crappers dancing in his head, Pop Pop, grandma and their their three daughters hopped in the family’s Bel Air and moved to the Sunshine State. For her younger sisters, the trip was one big pajama party on I-75. For my teen-aged mother, it was a nightmare.
Bradenton—the final resting place on grandpa’s continental journey—was 20 minutes west of a private men’s club in Rubonia, Florida. On a clear night, you could almost see the feiry glow of its burning cross in the night sky. If grandpa wanted to earn a good living as a plumber on Florida’s rapidly expanding Gulf Coast, he picked the right place to do it. As far as mom was concerned, Bradenton, Florida, and every redneck who lived there was full of shit.

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