Growing up in Neptune Beach, FL made me who I am today
Even though everyone says they’re from Jacksonville
When I am introduced to someone new and I tell them that I am from Jacksonville, Florida, I am lying. When I live at home, I go to Jacksonville almost every weekend, but that is not where I am from. It’s a little less complicated to say that, however, rather than tell them that I hail from a nameless barrier island separated from Florida by the Intracoastal Waterway. I am actually from Neptune Beach, a town with an area of 6.8 square miles and a population of just over 7,000.
Bordered by Jacksonville Beach and Atlantic Beach, my town is one in which nearly all of its inhabitants are natives. Save for my parents, who relocated to Neptune Beach from Louisiana over twenty years ago, nobody moves to the beach. They are born there, they go away to college, and they return to raise their children. Older folks are rarely blue-haired old ladies, and more likely tanned and tattooed surfers who went to Fletcher High School, the only public high school on the island. (Go Senators!)
There is a strong sense of community in our little beachside town, one that causes its residents to become friendly and helpful, if occasionally a bit overbearing. Locally-owned businesses are in abundance, and oceanside art festivals to support local artists are a monthly occurrence.
No matter how tenuously you know another member of the community, they will likely remember something about you. Perhaps you were a great soccer player in middle school, or maybe you were on the homecoming court. No matter your achievements, somebody in Neptune Beach remembers it.
Friendship, I believe, is the strongest force in a small town. Attending school with the same 500 people for 12 years has a tendency to forge strong bonds. My best friend grew up just a town over in Atlantic Beach and was introduced to me in the first grade. Now students at rival universities, we send each other texts at least once a week to remind each other of some long-forgotten memory: “Remember when our marine science teacher waved a horseshoe crab at the principal?” “Remember that project we did together on Martinique?” There will never come a time that we will cease to be friends; our parents are so close they have dinner without us, and I consider them as much my family as my own.
No matter our schedules, Ellie and I find time every Christmas to build stale and inedible gingerbread houses that, more often than not, crumble under the weight of thick layers of icing.
That brings me to the food. God almighty, the food. The Metro Diner on 3rd Street serves unbelievable dishes like thickly fried Monte Cristo sandwiches and grits showered with cheese. Whit’s Frozen Custard flaunts a new special flavor every day (and of course vanilla and chocolate) of creamy magnificence, served with a smile by a high school student working a summer job. Angie’s Subs is a Fletcher High staple, doling out delicious sandwiches to the swarm of teenagers taking advantage of their off-campus lunch privileges.
At any given time, the air in Neptune Beach smells like the ocean and some kind of delicious meal.
Most small towns don’t live up to the hype, but Neptune Beach is an exception. Though I am one of the few that ventured far away for school and hopes to one day relocate even farther, I am a Neptune Beach girl for the rest of my life. Growing up where I did shaped me into who I am today.
I am friendly with all my friends’ parents, and often skip “sir” and “ma’am” in favor of “mom” and “dad”. People I haven’t spoken to in years are bound to earn an “I love you and I miss you” when I inevitably happen upon them at the grocery store. I am literally a small town girl living in a lonely world. Wherever I end up, whether it be in a big city or a faraway tundra, I will never stop yearning for the scent of salt air and sand between my toes.