Chapter 1

The two day twenty hour drive from Arlington Heights, Illinois down to St. Pete Beach, Florida was uneventful and boring. In doing this drive it gave Don Carlson time to think about his life and why he was relocating to Florida. He wondered how he would enjoy living there and if his living there would be permanent or temporary.

He had gone to a small division two college on a basketball scholarship. At six foot three inches he had success in playing at the shooting guard position. He was equally successful in his studies as he graduated with a degree in history along with a minor in education. He had received a teaching certificate. Don had decided early in life that he wanted to be a high school teacher and a basketball coach.

Don had applied to and was accepted for a teaching position at a high school in the area where he lived. He was also appointed an assistant basketball coach. Three years later when the head coach retired, Don was named the head coach. He thought in the thirty years he had been a head coach he was fairly successful. His teams had won the conference championship eleven times and three times in the State tournament they had advanced to the super-sectionals before bowing out. Not winning the State title was a disappointment but he did admit the teams he lost to were more talented than his team.

Don was also an above average golfer with a seven handicap. After the basketball season ended he was the assistant golf coach.

His teaching of history initially required quite a bit of work the first year of his teaching. Preparing the lessons plans did take up considerable amount of time but he could use those same lesson plans in the following years. After all he thought, “History doesn’t change.”

He taught the subject as it was taught to him on the college level. Memorization of dates and names was not emphasized. He gave out reading assignments, and then for most of the class time called on the students to explain what they read. They quickly learned that if they didn’t want to be embarrassed they needed to do the assigned reading assignments. Don would spend the last ten minutes of the class summarizing and explaining what the students should have learned from the reading assignments.

In the same year that Don was named the head basketball coach he received the tragic news that his only uncle, Bill Carlson has been killed in a single car accident. He apparently was going too fast and hit an icy patch on the road which caused him to lose control and hit an embankment head on. He wasn’t wearing his seat belt and his older car did not have air bags.

Bill Carlson was single and worked for a large insurance company. He had for some unknown reason named Don and not his estate as the beneficiary of his fifty thousand dollar group life insurance policy. Since this was an accidental death the amount of insurance payout doubled.

Don was surprised and shocked at being named the beneficiary of the insurance policy as this was not a way he wanted to come into money. His parents had raised him to be a saver and to be prepared for a rainy day. Because of that he invested close to one half of the insurance proceeds into an S and P index fund. One half of what was left was used as a down payment on small house he purchased as he thought paying rent for an apartment was a waste of money.

He wasn’t sure what to do with the remainder of these funds until his father told him that friends of his, Charles and Carla Simmons had retired to the St Pete Beach area in Florida and were urging Don’s parents to do the same thing. They were saying that the area was going to grow and the real estate was going be more expensive in the future. Don’s father and mother didn’t plan on leaving the area but Don thought that real estate could be a good investment.

During the summer in between when school ended and his classes for obtaining his master’s degree started, Don drove down to Florida to check out the area. He met with Charles or Chuck as he preferred to be called and liked what he saw as to the area. Don purchased a two bedroom condo unit in the same building where Chuck lived. The condo was on the eight floor of a ten story building located next to the water. The condo unit was being sold because of the sudden death of the husband with the wife moving back north to be closer to their kids.