To the best of my recollection, my old man never had fun on family vacations. As children, we were convinced that he considered the entire proposition of traveling with one’s spouse and offspring to be only suitable when forging a new nation. Otherwise, he found the practice of the family vacation to be a form of social vandalism. As kids, we were convinced initially that his view of vacations, like most fun activities, was deemed a Communist plot. Later, we came to figure that he only participated because he was trying to infiltrate from within after “hippies turned the country soft.” Despite my siblings growing up predominantly during the 80’s, I was always keenly aware of his view of vacations as a necessary evil in order to prop up the floundering economy due to the “failures of the Carter Administration.” Other families received the many benefits that a vacation affords, such as the opportunity to reconnect with loved ones, or pondering the meaning of life - if only to determine, or remind themselves why they do what they do all year. Our old man spent all year practicing for car trips as a mobile interrogation device. These included frequent reminders that we were ‘lucky’ to enjoy the amenity level of the backseat of the family car. In addition, we were informed that he had willfully chosen to bring us along on the trip, along with the obligatory challenge to just as easily be back at home without having any ‘fun’ unless we adhered to his whimsy defined as fatherhood and the raising of children. Despite these annual suppression exercises, we lived to take our own vacations, and tell our own versions of the history lived through as bystanders with the same conviction. Before PTSD & Stockholm Syndrome, there was only childhood and parenting. Somewhere in those crash course sessions on keeping your mouth shut, we found our own ways in the world, and each tried to entertain the masses with our own brand of coping skills. These days, I’m reminded of this sentiment as I watch folks in their migrations from their campsites, rental houses, or cars for their seaside pilgrimages to reconnect with what’s most important to them. Although I’ve never stopped to ask people what they plan to do with all their stuff when they finally get to the beach, I’m fairly certain that my father would find contentment as he’d think they are embarking on the beach for colonization purposes. How in the world could lugging a hundred pounds of beach gear, food, drinks, and other merchandise that don’t even belong to you be considered ‘having fun’ to so many people? Previously, I would have dismissed this as participatory marketing, or due to some moral obligation that places humanity and salmon in strange, genetic, migratory patterns. Whether a benefit of perspective afforded by age, experience, or withstanding the education imposed by our elders, sometimes life has a way of reminding us of lessons we didn’t know we’d learned. Sometimes, it takes being confronted with the lessons barked by an angry old man, years after a childhood spent trying to avoid them, to understand the importance of a family to carry that hundred pounds of stuff that don’t belong to you over beach sand. 38 TYBEE BEACHCOMBER | JULY 2017 Tybee Insurance Agency Inc. Serving Tybee Island since 1987 • Homeowner’s Insurance • Flood Insurance • Renter’s Insurance • Condo Owner’s Insurance • All Commercial Insurance Call Carrie Traeger 204 First Street “Mrs. Jiggs” 912-786-5541 From the RIVER’S END... By Woody Hemphill Reservations ReseReservatio s 547-8145 14 145 5 com 912)(( TybeeBurkesBeachRentals.91 912) 12) )
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