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Chapter 18
I was a traveling sales rep in my
past life. We have all had
past lives as I call it, referring to periods of life in a different job
or place that were so different from our today’s time and place.
I was comfortable in big roof buildings and fancy offices from
these experiences. They did
not intimidate me. I have had
raw oysters on the half shell as one course of a multi-course meal, almost
loosing those in front of everyone as I tried to get them down.
I have had fresh, succulent two pound lobster in
Rhode Island
and that I loved, as well as many fast food dinners in restaurant parking
lots from the driver’s seat of my car.
I actually preferred the latter, but looked at those fine dining
experiences with fascination and I learned etiquette as well.
I gained some appreciation for the presentation of a good meal.
There were times I had taken Margie out to dinner at a fast food
restaurant, and from studying how they folded the napkin from these fine
dining experiences, would take the paper napkin and make a nice table out
of a paper box meal for her. With
a little effort of getting her chair, laying a second napkin across her
leg, with a third draped over my arm, a few spoken polite words, and you
could do a lot to make any meal feel elegant, no matter where you were.
I was not consistent with this however, but the times that I had
done it she would remember and it was very much appreciated.
I knew this because I had heard her talk about me to her women
friends, and these were the stories she chose to tell.
Margie too had many of those fine dining experiences and knew
presentation and etiquette skills. Most
of those fancy meals I attended, I did not have to pay for, typically a
result of a holiday or sales training dinner put on for the reps of these
companies I had worked for.
Us sales reps were all in suits and
fit the part for our day, and I had the single Windsor knot in my tie down
pat. I liked small knots.
The big knot, double
Windsor
in a tie felt like a fist under my neck to me, as well as looked like one.
I picked very thin silk ties as a result too, to make the knots
super small, and pulled them up to a very fine triangle and would always
gather the tie too after tying the knot, making a pleated look below the
knot. I actually opened the
back of ties to look for the stripes in the liner reflecting the quality.
I questioned the rationale in that, focusing on the patterns and
thin material as my main reason for picking a particular tie for myself.
The gold tie bar was popular then, pulling the collar together as
well as button down collars for a period of time.
Those accessories of the day made that small knot look crisp.
I was frequently asked how I did that.
I was very presentable and fashionable in my traveling salesman
days. English double breasted
suits were my preference, and for the earlier years in suits, wing tip
shoes. Those finally went out
for me as I opted for comfort from standing on concrete at trade show
halls for hours and sore feet prevailed. I
had that flair for looking nice, watched and learned, discriminating in
choices of how I would look, and it did pay off in the early years.
Eventually sport jackets and comfortable pleated front pants were
finding their way into my wardrobe, relaxing presentation a bit as my
ability to negotiate and speak in public were realized and the substance
of my ability took over as my major assets.
I was deep down a blue jean and t shirt person, and called myself
Doctor Jekyll and Mister Hyde as I peeled these clothes off after a long
week on the road and the desire to be myself again started being the goal
of the week; get home, and get these clothes off!
Speaking in public had become one of
my strongest points, and was requested to speak in sales seminars for our
products more often as those sales rep years progressed.
I frequently spoke to a room full of engineers, me a high school
graduate. Inform and
entertain, features and benefits, even handing out silver dollars which I
could still find at the bank at the time, rewarding correct answers to a
little series of questions that left everyone laughing at the end of my
presentations. I would throw
the coins, and the audience’s success at catching them became as much of
the fun as the questions. I
had learned our products so well that I did add to their knowledge as well
as provide technical tricks for the group that when the presentation was
done, they would even come up to me to clarify what I said so they could
complete their hand written notes to take with them.
My uncanny ability for math helped too.
I could fire answers to math problems off from my head as a natural
ability, which makes anyone seem like a genius to someone that struggled
with math. Even some college
grads would have difficulty in math and that is where I shined.
Natural ability takes over when that diploma is handed out, and
eventually prevails in the job world.
That I found out. I
think the college degree is overrated, and many companies miss out on some
really fine candidates as a result of their requirements.
I thought too, beyond the fundamentals, much of what they taught
when I was in school is now obsolete except the three R’s, some
classics; even Geography has changed in so many ways.
I always had a complex about my education level and would put in
twice the effort as there was no failure in my future.
It was not an option for me, raising my children and providing for
them as my priority at an early age. I
saw to that. I had the
fundamentals down pat. I did
very well in high school, even taking several years of typing that allowed
me to throw down written material fast.
Typewriters were the tool of that day.
Computers obviously prevailed, and was I glad I learned typing on
those old IBM Selectrics! I am
not sure they even have typing classes anymore.
I see computer classes advertised everywhere, but typing?
Maybe they still do.
Yes I was a good sales rep.
I was very good at what I did, but I hated the road.
I wanted to go home at night. I
missed Margie too. Those
week-long trips made the smell of a smokers’ hotel room all too familiar
and growingly undesirable. The
money was great too, but one realizes after a while that money is not the
almighty. I had learned what
the Almighty was and it sure wasn’t money.
Time is what I finally figured out to be the real value in our
humble lives. If I had reached
the age of seventy as a millionaire, it wouldn’t be as valuable as a
quality life of time with my wife at home and reaching 70 with a modest
savings. I finally learned
that dying with the biggest bank account, stress shortening the life span,
food that was poor in nutrition and high in fat that compounded the road
life, it was not the direction I wanted to go.
The second happiest day of my life was when I got that high paying
job. The happiest day of my
life was when I quit. I quit
traveling for work, and got to be with my wife at nights.
Driving is indeed one of the hardest occupations.
A friend said something to me that made real sense.
He said you could swing a hammer all day, to still have energy at
night for something else. Driving
all day however, left nothing in the energy department.
I started believing that as I would come home very tired after
driving those extra four hours that night rather than that one more night
in a hotel. Hallucinations
would include trees looking like tunnels on the two lane roads, one time
taking an exit on a major highway and forgetting to slow down as I got off
the exit ramp. Driving is
hypnotizing, not to mention tough on the prostrate from sitting all the
time.
Traveling in an RV with your wife was
a different story however. I
didn’t have to push to get places, push the limits just to get home to
be with her and sleep in my own bed and avoid that extra night in a hotel.
She was there to talk to, and a close married couple can be one in
thinking and conversation, so my other half was with me.
I could be home every night as the RV was a beautiful home in my
thinking, and with its nice appointments allowed me to be very comfortable
there. The cabinets in the
kitchen were nicer than our dated seventies style ranch home.
We had fun with our destinations, picking them and experiencing
them, and were done traveling for the moment when we got there.
The destinations were not big factories, rather beautiful scenery
commonly found at many RV parks. The
RV park work got me exercise rather than that car; that drive through -
fast food restaurant, straight to hotel lifestyle.
I didn’t do bars nor liked to drink, so night life was not a
desired option. I did
try to exercise, but could not be consistent with it, very much like a new
years resolution.
It was all now very different, and
now with these new adventures and speaking venues that Margie booked that
I would enjoy, again have hit the road.
It was late as we arrived in
Texas
. Tomorrow morning was a new
day, and the excitement started to set in knowing we would meet the
powerful Senate Majority Leader tomorrow morning.
We found our camping spot for the night.
Rolling in with the RV at night made for interesting mornings, to
wake up and see what it all looked like.
Texas
is a beautiful state, especially the capitol,
Austin
. It is a city of lakes, an
oasis of sorts. It is also
much warmer than where we left as we headed those several hours south.
It was winter now. I
always liked heading south for the winter.
The temperature climbed as we traveled, hour by hour.
After any drive however I was indeed tired.
We unhitched the truck as we pulled it away for use the next
morning, and leveled out the
RV with the hitch jack and the scissor jacks built to each corner, hooked
up the utilities, and as I came in from those regular choirs of RV travel,
knew I would sleep well. We
were here; ready for the adventure of our campaign trail, as this was our
first stop. I lie down and
don’t remember anything after that.
I must have been sound asleep within minutes.
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