Welcome to Florida (WTF) - Our Journey to Paradise

Welcome to Florida. If only I had a sand dollar for every time an odd occurrence was explained away with the unique expression: Welcome to Florida.

My wife, Vikki, and I decided to leave our home state of Wisconsin and follow our dream with a move to paradise, known to us as Florida. We had vacationed in the Sunshine State many times, and the sun and the sand had always called our names, so we finally followed the calling and landed in the town of Punta Gorda, just north of Fort Myers on the Gulf side of the state.

For the most part, paradise was just as we’d imagined, but as we settled into our new home, we experienced many quirky and previously unknown facts of life. Turns out, Florida is not all Mickey Mouse and beaches.

Several of our neighbors and colleagues are transplants themselves, experiencing many of the same abnormalities on their own when making the move south. As we shared our anecdotal stories with our now fellow Floridians, we were frequently met with that simple phrase in response: Welcome to Florida.

I began to jot down these stories so that we might have more to offer future Floridians when they shared their tales with us. As I abbreviated the phrase “Welcome to Florida,” I realized quickly that the acronym was WTF! It seemed appropriate that the common slang for “What the f——!” shared an abbreviation with the three words we heard so often.

As you read about our Welcome to Florida journey, you too might find yourself shaking your head and saying, “WTF!”