By Sandra Hurtes

This is the first of a two-part series. Next week, Sandra reflects on working with writing prompts, like the one that led to this essay.

The pouring rain during my vacation in Portugal sent me and many others on my tour group to the hotel bar. We pulled up comfy chairs and formed a semi-circle around a coffee table. I was traveling alone and liked having the security of the tour group. There were people to talk to at almost all turns— on exploratory walks, during meals, on the van that ferried us around. But what to talk about when we were on our own, no tour director, no sightseeing, no scripted agenda?

Well, “the children,” of course. At least for this, shall we say, past middle-aged group. A gregarious gentleman set the tone. He described his son’s academic and athletic feats as if we knew the boy and could feel the thrill of his achievements. The son was offered scholarships to two Ivies. With a quick glance around the circle, I noted rapt attention on everyone’s face. Were they really interested? I wondered. Perhaps my growing unease didn’t show.

I stood and walked to the bar to place an order. I flirted with the bartender, who was much younger than I. It was harmless chatter that quelled my need for frivolous conversation. Back with my group, a mother traveling with her adult daughter spoke about her grandkids who had just WhatsApp’d her from a theme park. When she was back home, the kids would be waiting.

The seat close to a man traveling solo opened. In a whispered tone, I asked what he thought of the conversation. He said he didn’t mind. He had nephews and nieces, and he had never wanted his own children. That was the difference between us; I had wanted children, but my life hadn’t worked out that way. But then again, wasn’t I lucky for my capacity to converse on many topics simply because I had no children?

I was about to say, “So, where do you guys live? Anyone reading anything good?” But my mind did a 180, as I suddenly understood the shut-out feeling my mother had often spoken to me about. Around the swimming pool at her Florida condo, the women bragged about their grandkids, of which there were always a few visiting, splashing in the pool, impossible to not see. My parents were the only non-grandparents in the circle. My father played cards, and I doubt the talk was grandkids. But my mother, a gregarious and intelligent woman, was lonely among her peers. At that moment in the hotel bar, I wished that I could soothe her, tell her, “I know exactly how you feel, mom.”

I felt lonely, too, even after I turned the focus to myself. During a brief pause, I said, “I don’t have children. I’m not sure how to break in, what to say.” There was an even longer pause, but then, the wife of the braggiest man said, “I didn’t think of that. Tell us about yourself.” The stage was mine, and I fumbled for a while but found my footing once I said I was a born and bred New Yorker. Everyone related to New York—college years, theater trips, children living in Williamsburg—veering dangerously close to the children again—but wound back to a reminiscence about single days living in a tiny studio in the West Village.

I was happy when the rain stopped. I stepped outdoors with a few travel companions into the clean, fresh air. Downtown was a short walk away. We walked single file along a narrow bluff across the road. The view of the Atlantic Ocean’s crashing waves, one wave after another and another, was spectacular. Sudsy water rose and curled inside the waves. Rather than take out my camera, I memorized the natural wonder. I would call upon that image the next time loneliness took me over. I would remember, I was there.

©2026 Sandra Hurtes

Sandra Hurtes is a writer and teacher living in New York. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Poets & Writers, Women in Judaism, and numerous other publications.