Making memories, not money, counts most

Some of us brag that we haven’t taken vacations in a long, long while, claiming that it’s more important to keep working, that things wouldn’t get done if we left, or that there’s no one else who can do whatever it is we do. Blah, blah, blah.

Even though studies show that vacationing is actually good for business, many business owners and executives decline to participate. Once, I belonged to such a group.

In 1972, Asylum Records released “Take It Easy,” a mega-hit for the Eagles.

Remember it? The melody is so good that even I, a person who sings like a wounded walrus, can croon it.

Last month, I came to understand the song’s true meaning. It took a grueling 3,800-mile vacation in a motor home with two teenagers and a 30-year-old with Down syndrome before I learned my lesson.

The teens were Brookes, my 17-year-old daughter, and Tucker, 15, who is my youngest son. Brian, my other son, is permanently anchored in childhood because of Down syndrome. He asked for a trip to Hollywood in celebration of his 30th birthday.

Making the long trip by motor home was my brilliant idea.

Don’t get me wrong; traveling by motor home is a grand experience. A fly-in to every stop would have been financially prohibitive. So … we drove, and drove, and drove. We saw the Painted Desert, the Grand Canyon, New Mexico’s most complete dinosaur museum, the Museum of Natural History, Flintstone Village – a cheesy version of Bedrock – La Brea Tar Pits, the OK Corral in Tombstone, Old Tucson, and the Mojave Desert in flower – something that hasn’t been seen in 60 years, I’m told. We even drove through downtown Winslow, Ariz., and it was a fine sight to see, though no one seemed to go out of their way to look at me. (Recall the lyrics to “Take it Easy”?)

A couple of days on the beach in Venice, Calif., watching the sun dip itself into the great Pacific rounded out the stay in Los Angeles, where we spent far more time stuck in traffic than anything else. Our return, through Dallas, culminated in a party for Brian that will always tug at my heart.

Eddie Griswold couldn’t have made the trip better. Eddie, you may recall, was Clark Griswold’s ne’er-do-well relative who dumped RV sewage into the storm drain on that nice suburban street in the movie, “Christmas Vacation.” I was tempted to do the same, but I didn’t. Instead, I paid $10 at a couple of RV parks, a painful expense simply because I had about as much money as Eddie Griswold had.

In reality, I couldn’t afford to take the trip in the first place, and my job as a commissioned sales rep meant that I didn’t earn anything while I was away. I left broke and came home broker – it was the Eddie Griswold thing to do.

Irresponsible? Counterproductive? Yep. All those things and more. Not something top business executives do. I knew that I’d made a bad business decision to take the trip, and I was guilty as hell about it for the first 500 miles. That’s when “Take It Easy” came on the radio.

It was well-timed. Hours of close confinement in an RV, I’ve noted, reduce social compatibility to a level of behavior approaching that of starved, caged timber wolves. Teenaged brothers and sisters are genetically disposed to taunt one another frequently, but Tucker and Brookes were nigh close to violence.

Even I’d permitted, borrowing a line from the song, “the sound of my own wheels to make me crazy.”

However, it was Brian who suggested that we all needed to calm down, and noted that we’d better enjoy ourselves while we could, since we’d likely be eaten by dinosaurs crossing New Mexico. He always did have a sixth sense about things. Then, he sang “Take It Easy” with me.

That’s when it clicked. The vacation with my kids was something much bigger and more important than money. Together, we were harvesting the one commodity that we will eventually run out of – time. We were making memories. That way, when time runs out for any one of us, the others can cling to the memories, and hopefully, treasure them.

It’s OK for you to call me to task for my irresponsibility. But before you do, call up the oldies station and ask them to play “Take It Easy.”

Sometimes the cure for going crazy is as simple as doing something crazy. Long live Eddie Griswold.

Bob May is former managing partner of five local radio properties and is now engaged as a southwest Missouri sales consultant. He can be reached at spiffsdad@aol.com.