I have a lifelong love of work. This is a thinly-defined noun for me, however, because “work” must be something which I would cheerfully do even without being paid for it. Ever since I was fourteen years old, I have made a point of seeking out tasks that gave me pleasure and happened to yield income as well.
To be clear, there were definitely some jobs I took on in my teenage years that I did not enjoy. I did yard work, but I can’t stand sweating. I did some data entry, but I couldn’t stand the drudgery. The kind of gainful employment I enjoyed most consistently as a youngster was writing. I began with nationally-published computer magazines at age 15, moving on to books at age 16. I published my first book at that age, followed by about twenty more over the next four years. I just finished my most recent one, but for now I think I’m out of ideas.
My adult life started off by abandoning this tradition of doing only what I loved to do, mainly for economic reasons. Working at Apple was OK, particularly because of the culture, but I wasn’t really made to be a marketing puke (the name we gave ourselves). I worked at an investment bank doing high-tech product management, but I couldn’t stand the tasks I was given, and to this day I can remember quietly but audibly chanting to myself as I approached the office at the Transamerica Pyramid, “seventy-two thousand five hundred dollars per year; seven-two thousand five hundred dollars per year.” (Hey, way back in 1991, that was good money for a kid just out of college, and I had to keep pounding the figure into my head to make up for the fact I couldn’t stand going to work.)
Not long after, I came to my senses and at age 26 did what I was made to do, which is start my own business and work for myself, and I have never turned back from that decision. I hate being an employee to anyone except myself, and although there are plenty of occasions when I wonder if I’d be better off had I stuck to a “real” job my entire adult life (complete with a big salary, big benefits, and all the rest), I know deep down that it’s just not me. I’m not cut out for office politics, and I’m not enough of a cash-whore to stop caring about my urge to be creative. I have sacrified a lot of money for the insistence on doing what I love.
I say all of this for two reasons. The first is that I’m sitting on a plane, and I’m bored, and I’d rather write something for you good people rather than watch some insipid movie. The second is that I just finished up my family vacation, and I thought it would be a good time to reflect upon it, because a vacation by its very nature is the opposite of work.
i take vacations for one reason and one reason only: my family. If i were a single man, I suspect I’d 
never go anywhere. Perhaps that makes me sound boring. Perhaps it’s because I am boring. But I simply don’t have the urge to leave. My love of my work dispatches to need to “get away from it all.” I don’t want to get away from it. I like it. And I pity those who have little to look forward to except for the allotted time to get the hell away from their grind.
Thus, my life is backwards. Work is play, and play is work. Vacations for me are far more emotionally-taxing than my self-selected avocation. On “vacation”, it’s my task to keep everyone entertained and happy, plus I have to pay for the goddamned thing. Mercifully, I really like being with my kids, so it’s really not so bad.
Where we stayed was the Four Seasons on the Big Island of Hawaii, which is, according to Conde Nast, the best resort in the world. They certainly make you pay the price for it. The cheapest rooms are $995 per night, and over a six day stay, I racked up a $6500 hotel bill. The occupancy tax alone – which is just one of the taxes that you are charged – is the same amount as a typical night’s stay at a regular hotel. Dinner for 4 (which, mind you, is half made up of young kids with small stomachs) easily runs over $200, so charges add up swiftly.
It’s probably the fact that I’m just plain weird that compels me to play anthropologist on these journeys. I’ve never fit in very well with my fellow humans, and I’m a better observor than participant. I like to drink in what I see and notice how people behave with each other and with themselves. I am the brain in the glass jar with eyeballs dangling over the rim. In short, I like to watch.
So watch I did. And you know what I found out? Solidly upper middle-class people paying big bucks to stay at a chic resort aren’t any happier than they normally are. I saw fathers screaming out their children to get out of the fucking water. I saw couples who had nothing to say to one another.
I saw families whose daughters were the same spherical shape as their mothers, and one by one, they waddled to and fro, eyeglasses perched on their tips of their bulbous noses, waiting for the next buffet and illlustrating Archimedes’ principal of liquid displacement as they sank into the pool.
I saw teenage girls with expensive shirts that had “Happy Happy Happy” written with sequins on the front, looking dour and bellicose, a few steps ahead of their equally sour-faced parents. And I saw smooth-skinned Japanese adults, acknowledging no one as they walked, making their way to the golf course to burn away their time on what, I’ve long thought, is a pointless activity.
But it wasn’t all bad.
When I have the opportunity to get closer to nature, I have the opportunity to get closer to God. And although I don’t say so, I want my children to do the same. Some of the parents there simply checked their children into the Kids Club, which is basically a portion of the resort where they can plop themselves in front of huge monitors and play video games.
Not my kids, though. No way. You aren’t going near that crap.
They joined me in the water. Years ago, my wife and I did a lot of scuba diving all over the world (both of us were certified as advanced divers), and now with children, snorkeling is a step back in that direction. I was pleased that my kids were naturals at it. Even with the swells and currents, they held fast, and the four of us swam as a team, seeking out giant turtles, tropical schools, and coral. The underwater world is an alien nation. It is the swiftest way to see something wholly foreign and alive, and the life of the sea can sing to you. It sure beats the holy hell out of a video game.
I’m glad the trip is over. I’ve done my duty, and I can go back to my charts and the daily grind. I like the daily grind, and I’ve been able to carve out for myself a miniscule molecule of the economy to pay for my family’s expenses. I’m grateful that you are here (particularly those who have manned up and signed up for Slope+). As I so often say, without you, there wouldn’t be any Slope. So thanks for making my vacation possible. And, more importantly, thanks for giving the ability to give my vacation a merciful end. I’d rather be right here with you, and away from everyone else who is trying to get away from it all.
