Ponce, Puerto Rico – Since this past Sunday I have been spending time at a resort on Ponce, Puerto Rico, with my parents. Ponce is the city where my grandmother was born. It’s not much of a city, although to be honest I have not seen much of it. My parents are both 88 years old, and not quite as spry as they used to be, so I have mostly been sticking to the resort with them and spending time doing what they do. Their day consists mostly of eating and moving from one section of the resort to another: from the restaurant, to the beach, to the pool, to the bar, to the lobby, out to dinner, and home. They are usually done in by 6PM, so I have the evenings to myself. But there is not much to do in the resort in the evenings other than sit at the bar, and I am not one to head out and find the nightlife in downtown Ponce. Much as I enjoy listening to salsa music, I think my cha-cha days are behind me.
My parents, thank goodness, are for the most part in good health and retain their mental facilities, especially my father, but I can see the slowing down. They have been coming to this same resort every April for the past 7 years. They began by celebrating their 60th wedding anniversary at this place, and this year is their 66th. Being retired has now allowed me to come and spend time with them here, which I know they have enjoyed. It seems many of the staff know them pretty well as “regulars.” My mother speaks Spanish, although on this trip I have begun to discover that the language is leaving her through disuse. She has a tendency to use English first even when the staff addresses her in Spanish. I have been using Spanish as much as I can, but my speaking skills are much weaker than my comprehension or reading skills. We went out to a small boardwalk cosina yesterday for lunch, and I did all the ordering because the young man did not speak much English, and my mother could not hear him over the loud music (there is no such thing as background music in Puerto Rican culture). This experience is motivating me to spend time becoming more fluent in Spanish, probably through online courses. Notably, Google Translate has come in handy.
I am not a resort kind of person. The humidity is a bit high for this time of year, and unless you’re an avid swimmer or golfer or just like hanging around poolside with a mojito or a piña colada, there really is not that much to do. It is very much in the vein of sitting around doing nothing. Today I did bring a book with me (Kindle) to the beach while we sat, and that was better than just sitting. But I like to be doing things when I am on vacation, seeing sights or hiking or something along those lines. Ponce seems to be a little bit short on the sights: a small museum of art (which my father panned), a former mansion that’s now a museum, and that’s about it. Puerto Rico is actually a distressed place at the moment; it is not built primarily on the tourist industry as are places like Bermuda or the Virgin Islands. Overall the island is pretty run-down.
But this is not about me being on vacation. It’s about spending time with my parents, which is a nice thing now about retirement. No doubt in less than 10 years they will both be gone, so it’s great for me to spend this time with them and share a little of what they have come to love. And in a sense, I know I am looking at my own future in about 20 years, with any luck. Perhaps by then the idea of sitting in the lobby of a resort hotel in the warm weather will have gained a new respect from me. I am pretty damn sure it beats sitting in a nursing home. -twl
