A Room and a History

My writing space

I have several spaces in my home for my different interests, but only one for writing. My writing room — my office — was once the back porch of our house when it was first built exactly half a century ago.

The original house was a modest structure, one that a young college instructor could afford, but it was solidly built of reinforced concrete. When you live in the Caribbean, you know that a hurricane sooner or later is likely. According to my father-in-law, I had it built at the wrong place and in the wrong direction. The custom at the time in the eastern mountains of Puerto Rico was to have a house built on a paved country road with the entrance facing it.

My wife and I had it built about a quarter of a mile from the road — facing away from it and toward an expansive view of the mountains, the faraway city of San Juan, and the sea.

As a child, she would often climb through the tropical forest on her family’s property to the highest point where she could see the sea.

When we were seriously dating — I was still a student at the University of Puerto Rico — she showed the view to me and, of course, I loved it too. We hoped that someday we could live there.

As a wedding gift, her father gave her the deed to that land. It was a generous act, but also an astute one. He knew that wherever her gringo husband would take her, she — and he — would eventually want to come back home.

We did leave the island for graduate school in Pennsylvania. Then, a few years later, after my master's and doctorate degrees and a few years of teaching, we returned. Between us, we had saved enough to buy more land and to have the house built. It made my wife’s parents, who became our neighbors, very, very happy!

Much of what we earned in our various careers over the next five decades went into the property. We eventually tripled it in size: we added terraces to take advantage of the views in all directions, so we could be outside in the constant summer weather.

We built a large outdoor living room and a small swimming pool, an indoor sunroom, an art studio, and an exercise room. When our two children grew up and moved on to new lives in new places, we converted one bedroom into a sewing room, another into a guest room. We ended up with many spaces, but the former porch was mine.

I worked there on folding tables with boxes for files and books. Then together we built bookshelves, installed new flooring over the porch tiles, and had a desk and cabinets custom built and installed. My last career (after 25 years at the university) was as a magazine editor. I retired at 65, but for ten more years I worked on the magazine from this space.

Now I spend all of my writing time and some of my reading time here. When I want to rest my eyes from a computer screen, I glance out the windows and enjoy the same view that captivated us so long ago.

Many writers today can write on a laptop or tablet wherever they happen to be. I can only write in my home office. At my age, I need a relatively large monitor to write and plenty of light to read, as you can see in the photos.

But just as important, the old porch and I (together with the house) have grown together. We share a history and I have written many of its stories here.

Most important, this is where my muse resides.

Curious about my published fiction, poetry or essays? You can browse my archive HERE.