Hard to believe that it is over six months since my last post. A lot has happened. Grants and contracts won and lost. Dear friends and family have died and new grandchildren been born. We finished three new games and started on a fourth. I’m writing this post from Curacao, where I decided to go to get an estimate of what it would be like to live in the Caribbean. What I did not do was get a room at an all-inclusive resort with hot and cold running margaritas. Instead, I rented a small apartment a five-minute drive from the beach. It has a pool and I have a nice patio where I sit out and work during the day.
What would it be like to live in the Caribbean?
Well, the first day I was here, I got a text saying that my mother was in the hospital. At first, we didn’t think it would be anything serious, but we turned out to be wrong and she died within a matter of days. When a parent dies at 92, you can’t say it was wholly unexpected, but I really did think she would be around for several more years. That’s what it will be like if you are far away. When deaths happen, births, marriages or graduations, you won’t be there.
Did I feel bad not to be there for my mom’s death?
To be honest, I did what I had told her,
Mom, I’m going to come out and visit you now, while you’re around to enjoy it, instead of coming out for your funeral.
However, if I move this far away, there definitely will be times when a new grandchild is born or someone gets sick and I won’t be around. Yes, there are flights but with waiting at the airport, customs and driving it’s 14 hours back to Los Angeles and over 20 hours to my daughter’s farm in Hawaii.
It’s not the big events I would miss out on so much as the small ones, the Mothers Day brunches, picnic with grandkids on the beach, trips to Disneyland (that’s small if you live a 45-minute drive away).
Being sick or in pain anywhere sucks
The third day I was here, I hurt my back. As a young person, if I had an injury it would occur at an international training camp for judo or while playing soccer in a friendly match against the Crystal Palace staff. So, you might think that I was scuba diving or sailing or something that equally made it worth it. Nope. It might have been when I lunged for that glass of wine falling off the nightstand, or it might just be one of those flare ups that happen at random with my arthritis.
Whatever the cause, for a couple of days, I felt like I was being stabbed in the back every five or ten minutes. I’ve never been in pain like that except when I had my knee replaced. Could it be a worsening of arthritis brought on by the stress of my mom’s death? Possibly. All I know for sure is that for two days, I could not sleep, make myself a cup of coffee, eat or lay down because I was in too much pain. I could have been in Curacao, Chicago or Boonesville, Iowa for all of the difference it would have made.
This experience made me even more resolved to travel and do what I can while I can. You might think that some of my trip was wasted since I spent it writhing in pain, not even in bed because I couldn’t comfortably lay down. You’d be wrong. One of the things I wanted was to learn what it would be like to live in the Caribbean and, since I have arthritis, this is part of it. Ironically, even though one of my goals coming here was to learn to relax, I’m in the least pain while standing or sitting, so I’m going to get caught up on some work each day and then spend a few hours exploring the island.
The U.S.A. is an easier place to buy stuff
When my back first started hurting, I walked to the grocery store to buy aspirin. It turns out you can only buy aspirin at a pharmacy. Since there was no way I was going to drive a car in a foreign country when I could not trust myself to be able to make any sudden movements, my lovely family tried to have a care package with aspirin, heating pad, etc. sent by Amazon or Instacart, neither of which exist here. Federal Express is making a delivery on Tuesday, five days later. Yes, I do have a prescription for pain medication but it makes me feel stupid and nauseous and I definitely don’t want a controlled substance in my possession in a foreign country no matter how nice and polite the country feels.
That being said, it’s neither difficult nor expensive to get most things in Curacao as long as you don’t want something very specific. For example, Post Raisin Bran costs twice as much as the local version of cereal, which, since I don’t know Dutch, the name looked like Frecheled Frutas Secha Kebleizer to me but tasted just fine. Things that aren’t shipped far, like mangos and coffee don’t cost much.
Because cruise ships dock here and there are a number of all-inclusive resorts, there are plenty of restaurants and bars catering to tourists, of varying quality and all over-priced. There is the usual cruise ship section of downtown, with cheap souvenirs and a few local artists. I did buy a painted sign from one of them.
So, what have I learned?
That pretty much wherever you go, there you are. Wherever I land, I’m going to end up working for the next few years, not because I have to but because there are still some goals I want to accomplish, games I want to make, a game platform I want to see finished, programming languages I want to learn.
Don’t waste the days when you are healthy, because you have no idea how long they will last.
While I love the weather in the Caribbean – it seems to be in the eighties here 24/7 – I love my family more, so if I do relocate somewhere, even temporarily, it will be where I can visit them. There are five-hour direct flights from Los Angeles to Jamaica. One of my daughters is interested in moving to Spain. So, those are my next two digital nomad locations. I’ll be sure to pack more aspirin, heating pads and ice packs.
