Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
He caught my eye in the mirror.
“I'm not much of a newspaper reader,” he laughed. “No, someone mentioned it to me.
One of my customers.”
He thought for a moment.
“Actually, he said he and his partner had bought a house down there.”
By now I probably shouldn't have been shocked, but I was.
“On Vieques?”
“A little island off the coast of Puerto Rico, right?”
“That's it.”
“I think they're going to open a restaurant on the island…something like that.”
“Good God.”
I tried to imagine what it would be like to buy a house and open a restaurant in Vieques
at the same time. Living hell.
Others simply called us up and introduced themselves. This included the Butlers, our
neighbors up the hill. Through Jane, we knew the basics about this youngish couple from
Philadelphia.
He was a hedge fund manager, she was a physician. They had four teenage children. On
more than one occasion they had very kindly referred guests to us when they had a party
too big for their house.
The second or third time this happened, I got Ellen Butler's email address from Jane
and sent her a thank you note. A few weeks later she called.
“Jane took us down to see your beautiful house,” she said. “I hope you don't mind.”
I couldn't help laughing.
“Not a bit. She brought us up to see your house several months ago. I assume all her
owners have seen each others' houses.”
She laughed too.
“Anyway, come use our pool anytime the house is empty.”
This was very gracious too—so gracious that I decided not to tell her we'd already en-
joyed a dip or two.
☼ ☼ ☼
Speaking of fellow homeowners.
Allow me to introduce you to Jonah, a graphic designer from New Hope, Pennsylvania
who called us one day out of the blue after noticing a feature on our house's web page he
wanted to replicate on his own.
He and his partner had bought a house in Vieques two years before us but had broken
up soon afterwards.
Anxious not to lose his investment (and his potential retirement haven), Jonah had
rustled up enough cash to buy out his ex-partner's share of the mortgage and was now feel-
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