And then there is Roma. She defies description in many ways but this is worth a try.
First of all she is old. I’m not how old she really is but she knows intimate details about the life of George Washington. Very intimate details! She’s up there but she refuses to grow up.
I remember her before she was the Queen. Back then she was the “Yard Goddess” mowing lawns and wacking weeds wearing shorts and bandanas. She would finish up the work in the morning and then meet Johnny O and Judy for lunch and then it was on the way to the daily pool game at 2:00. It was this way for years.
Then the people in charge of the Beach Bum parade lost their collective minds …um, that’s an oxymoron I think because it implies that they have minds … anyway, they elected Roma Beach Bum Queen several years ago. Roma took this as an opportunity to anoint herself Queen of the island. Now everybody calls her Queen Roma.
The daily pool game has gone by the wayside but Roma conducts a weekly tournament at the Quarter on Tuesday nights. She charges you $6 to play though she just sticks the money in her pockets. She has berated me into becoming a regular though in true Tybee fashion I am rarely on time. She lets me play anyway. After I pay.
She claims to be in charge of the daily Bored meeting at Fannies-On-the-Beach though we really don’t pay much attention to her. Well, the people who work at Fannies pay attention to her or she throws a fit disrupting food and drinks being delivered to customers. I’ve watched her run people off and often wondered why Jenny Orr who owns Fannies allows the Bored meeting to be there at all.
Jenny’s response to the daily disruptions? Buy Roma a super large chair for her to sit in on the sidewalk that has Queen Roma written in magic marker on it. Decorate the sidewalk with plants around Roma’s throne and set up one table just for the royal one. The table has a rose on it.
It just makes me want to flotch!
Oh, that’s another thing about Queen Roma. She doesn’t allow cussing at the Bored meeting or the pool tournament. Because she knows that the people of Tybee cannot complete more than three sentences without using cuss words, she made some up.
“Floch!” Roma will scream when she sees something that doesn’t like or stubs her toe.
“Did you see that flotching idiot?” she’ll ask.
We all just go along with it.
Now Roma is into merchandising and sells hats, visors and tee shirts that have “Tybidiot” written on them. Roma made that word up too. O Johnny (not to be confused with Johnny O) lost his mind and had them made for her. Wait, that’s another oxymoron!
I once witness Roma moon the Tybee Island City Council. The entire room gagged and gave her what she wanted. She once came to my house and vandalized my car by decorating it for Christmas including a life sized lit reindeer on top. That fine outstanding publication “The Tybee Breeze” repeatedly honors her as the islands best character.
It’s all gotten out of hand. All of these people are coming to Bored meetings that none of the rest of us knows. She has stared her own Face Book page, “Roma Just Roma” that she tenderly updates everyday. Once, she got mad that we were not paying enough attention to her so she staged her own death. Everyone fell for it except me and she has yet to forgive me for it.
So Johnny O has started a breakaway Bored meeting on the pier that doesn’t involve Queen Roma. We’ll see what happens.
Though I understand that Roma started a romantic affair with Dean who runs the pier (and could pass for George Washington if he takes his teeth out) and now he closes it claiming that it’s too cold to operate. So we all show up at Roma’s flotching Bored meeting.
That’s Roma. Just flotching Roma!
