Travel Reference
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distance between treads is a given. And you can't expect people to climb over a balustrade
to get upstairs. So what exactly does Alfredo plan to change?”
“I have no idea. But I saw the look in his eye. He'll make it work if he possibly can.”
I took a deep breath. “Are you sure?”
She sighed.
“Absolutely not.”
In the end Alfredo took the staircase apart and put it back together, piece by piece, ad-
justing the space between each step infinitesimally.
It made all the difference and a week later the whole thing was in place.
Jane sent photos.
It was heaven.
☼ ☼ ☼
Coming back to Vieques was always a thrill.
Admittedly, the journey itself had become a bit humdrum—it's hard to get excited
about being crammed into a seat designed for a masochistic elf for almost four hours.
But once we landed in Vieques we always felt a shiver of anticipation. We were back!
And yet no matter how excited we were, we invariably experienced a sinking feeling
when we turned that final corner and began climbing the hill towards our house. After all,
we never quite knew what to expect.
The last leg of our return journey that October was no different. The neurosis
du jour
was our suspicion that Jane had somehow managed to photograph the spiral staircase from
its only favorable angle. When viewed in person, we feared, it would have all the appeal of
a gigantic barnacle on a ship's hull.
The night before our return to the island my overactive imagination had even trans-
formed my anxieties into a nightmare in which I began going down the stairs and literally
couldn't stop. There was no bottom. It didn't take a house call from Dr. Freud to figure out
that the never-ending downward spiral of my dream was a remarkably apt metaphor for the
staircase project itself.
Ten hours later we unlocked the carport gate and turned towards the staircase with equal
measures of excitement and foreboding. I'm not sure exactly what we expected—maybe
just that this newest addition to our house would somehow ruin the whole effect—but our
fears were completely unfounded.
If anything, the stairs were a huge plus. Pristine white, faultlessly designed, and eleg-
antly compact, the staircase was like a modern sculpture with benefits—it not only looked
good, it got you from one place to another with ease and style.
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