Myakka River State Park

Unfortunately I got this shirt a long time ago and never really paid much attention to it. That said, I don't remember its origin exactly.
I can deduce a few things from I though. Firstly, since it is from Sarasota, Florida I must have it because of my brother Rick, who lives there. So, I either got this when visiting him and this State Park or when my dad went out there and grabbed one of these from the gift shop. The last option would be that my bother picked it up from around where he lives and sent it out to me as a gift one year.
By the look of the wear and tare I actually got around to using this shirt on a regular basis. I don't normally wear shirts like this -wildlife or state park themed- but free is free. I mean I'm pretty sure that I didn't choose to buy I myself. I will admit that it brings a certain diversity to my rather uniform lineup of nerd/pop culture/corporate tees. After today I think will be one of the shirts that get packed away; it just isn't "me".
On the front is a big illustration of what I'm gonna call a crocodile, and it's in a swamp. I suppose that the swamp in particular is indeed the Myakka River State Park, known for it's luscious swamps statewide. At the bottom of the design it says "Fantasy Tee's 99" so that should give you a good idea of the time period we're talking about, I was maybe 14. The only other elements on this shirt are on the left sleeve -which I'm sure you can't make out in the picture because it's on a grey shirt-. The text says "Myakka River State Park Sarasota, Florida". If it didn't have this on there I would probably never know where this shirt came from.
In my opinion wearing this shirt makes me feel like a redneck, or that's what I think other people would think. It's hard to go around saying that you don't care what your appearance looks like while having thoughts like that. I suppose that's what self delusion's all about! I got this at a time when I was just getting into high school with much harsher fashion critics. It's a time in your life that you can make a lot of mistakes and get really carried away in drama. A time when you probably have a lot of people telling you that all of the hype and criticism doesn't matter. But you think that, since the world revolves around you, peer approval is paramount. It seems like some of that has still stuck with me. If you're somehow in a position like that I'll now be the one to tell you that "'hater's gonna hate', and to just 'be yourself' so that you aren't putting on some stupid façade because EVERYONE IS JUST AS INSECURE AS YOU!" Hah, there, now let it be said that I did something for society at some point.

When I was in school this was just a fun random shirt, I also got to brag about a trip -a good talking point-. Actually, I was mulling this over all day today; I hadn't read the shoulder text until some time later in the afternoon and was going under the assumption that I got it in Louisiana. We did have a nice swamp tour there that was pretty cool; they even did some 'gator ranglin'! (I guess I've switched my feelings on the species by the end of this post ha!)