What We Really Do Here: An Anonymous Love letter to the Service Industry

Now that the winter tourist season is coming to an end, and before the summer tourist season starts, I find myself reflecting on what it is that we really do.

Restaurant and bar owners, shop owners, service staff, hotel staff, surf rental companies… I could go on and on. We all contribute to what is a thriving, yet mostly humble destination town.

But really, what is it that we actually do?  Are we making a difference, or are we just working tirelessly to make everyone else happy?

As someone who has worked in the service industry on and off since I was a teenager, I often ask myself why I do it. Why do I sacrifice time with family and friends, miss weddings, funerals, birthdays, holidays? Is it worth the stress and sacrifice? Is there really a purpose?

It is not brain surgery, after all. Life will go on with or without my tiny little place in a remote corner of a small island.

Ultimately, I (we) do it because it is in our soul. It is something we can try to walk away from, try different things, but it always brings us back.

But still, the question is, are we really making a difference? The answer may be that we are making a bigger difference than any of us realize.

In just the past few weeks, a few stories come to mind.

A couple who come every year to visit for a month or two. This time, when I asked how long they would be here, they replied that it would just be a week, and that their adult kids were with them. When I asked why such a short visit this time, she said, because my cancer is back and I have to be back in 6 days for chemo. Optimistically, I wondered how long the treatments would last this time. Her reply: until I die. This will be the last time I am in Rincón. I just wanted to see it and feel it one more time.

A week later, a couple in their thirties came in, and one of them looked vaguely familiar. I mentioned that I felt like we had met before. He told me that his father was a regular customer when he lived in Rincón. I remembered the father and his dog Bosco. They had moved to San Juan. I asked how they were doing and unfortunately, the father had passed away. The son was on a trip to honor him, visiting all of his favorite places.

Then there was the Añasco native now living in New York who comes once a month to see his dad whose health is failing. But this time, he is here for a little longer because he is here to bury him. He stops in for just one glass of wine, and to take a breath before he sees the rest of the family and continues on with the weight of everything that comes next.

A nurse, first generation Cuban American. Not just any nurse, but a pediatric cancer nurse. I can’t imagine a more heart-wrenching and emotionally draining job. At only 31 years old, she is not sure she can do it any longer but needed a break to decide.

Next to her was a young doctor from Croatia who was literally born into war. His mother fled under fire with him and his sister under her arms. He is now a psychiatrist dealing with his own demons and wondering if he ever wants to bring a child into this complicated world. He simply needed a moment to escape to Rincón to reflect and relax.

And it’s not just tourists.

 A professor who lives in Mayagüez but teaches four days a week in San Juan stops in Rincón every Friday to take a breath and regroup before heading home. A doctor and his wife from Cabo Rojo come every week just to get a break from their daily lives. A family from Ponce comes once a month just to get away.

The couple going through a divorce who just need to talk to someone, anyone really. No judgment, just someone willing to listen. The doctor, lawyer, banker, government worker (because who is ever nice to them?), or parent who needs a quick break before heading back to work or home to their family. After all, they are always better at work and home when they don’t take their frustrations with them.

It’s the family who can’t emotionally endure another power outage and spends that little extra money they have on dinner out or a night at a hotel or Airbnb. It’s the child who has been saving their allowance to buy that perfect thing.

And don’t forget us. During busy times, when we get just one second to take a break for that margarita, delicious pastry, perfectly brewed cup of coffee, half pint of beer, plate of comfort food or take out, we are there to take care of each other.

We simply offer a chance for people to take a pause in their everyday lives.

Everyone has a story and we will never know most of them. But even a comma, that brief pause inserted in the right place, changes the meaning of a sentence. And one sentence can change an entire story.

No, what we do is not brain surgery. But sometimes, it is exactly what allows the brain surgeon to keep going.