Moving Day

Twenty-four years ago I found my niche in life. It wasn't until much later that I realized that I had found it. I was telling a friend about all the different types of jobs I had done. (Broadcast radio, sales, heavy equipment operator, paper hanging, computer programming, and so on...) He asked me, "Out of all the different jobs you had, what was your favorite?"

I had never thought about that before. But, as I reviewed what I had done to determine what I had enjoyed the most, only one job really stood out.

In the '80s I had been programming computers for a diversified company. Among other things, they owned construction firms, a lake/pond management business, and Redbrush Park (swimming, rides, camping, rooms and cabins). In early 1986 the general manager of the park asked me if I would be interested in managing the camp desk and housekeeping for the season, which began in the spring. The position didn't pay much...way less than what I billed for programming. (The park was mainly staffed by high school and college students during their summer vacation.) But, I had visited the park, and I loved it. So, I took the job just because I wanted to.

As I was self-employed and was already running two businesses of my own, I told the general manager that I could only commit to 3 1/2 days per week. But, I loved the work so much that I'd generally get to the park around 7:00 am (long before anyone else), and often wouldn't leave until after midnight...sometimes taking only one break for a meal. Each week my "3 1/2 days" amounted to well over 40 hours. When I programmed the computer at the park, I didn't bill for my time; I just did it as an employee (at the "summer job" rate).

I discovered that what I enjoy more than anything else is making people happy. If a guest was unhappy -- regardless of whether or not the park was in any way at fault -- I made it my mission to fix it...whatever "it" happened to be. I used a segment of a PBS video (that was based on Tom Peters' book In Search of Excellence) to show my camp desk and housekeeping people how "cast members" are trained at Walt Disney World. As a group, we had a lot of enthusiasm, and the video gave us a solid goal.

The only negative part about the job was that the park lost oodles of money every single year, which meant that around midsummer -- when it always became clear that this year would not be "the year" that the park would get "turned around" -- the general manager would become extremely irritable, and vent his frustration all over whoever happened to be around (although never at me). More than once I walked into his office to confront him after he had vented on one of my employees. Each time I would explain to him that, if he had a problem with the way one of my people was doing her job, he needed to come directly to me, since -- in every single case -- the employee was following my orders to the letter! The manager would apologize to me and promise that it wouldn't happen again.

Until the last time it happened.

The manager left a retirement-aged employee standing in the middle of the gift shop crying her heart out. I consoled her the best that I could, then went directly to his office. His response: "This time I'm not going to apologize." I quit on the spot. (On my way out the manager asked, "Can we still call you to work on the computers?" My answer: "Of course!" I would be more than happy to get paid far more without any of the drama!)

Fast forward twenty-some years...

After about a year of fulltime RVing, I found a campground that really needed help: Honey Bear Campground. The owner -- who has never camped a single time in her life -- had bought the campground 6 months earlier, and was in way over her head. I just started looking for things to do and ways to help out, and stayed about a month. Among other things, I created a system for reporting and tracking problems...repairs, errors and things like that. Had it not been for the owner, I'd have stayed there all season. But, she was bleeding money and was even more difficult to get along with than the manager of Redbrush Park had been. (During my first week at Honey Bear Campground I broke up a fight between the owner and a guest!) Finally, one morning -- after I had watched her walk all over a couple of her work campers for the umpteenth time -- I hitched up my house, told the owner goodbye, and left.

A month later she called me and invited me to come stay at the campground over 4th of July weekend. I knew she was just looking for some more free help (on a particularly busy weekend), but I didn't mind. I really enjoyed working hard for the campground guests. I showed up July 1, and endured a few more weeks of random neural firings.

Things came to a head the day that I busted my tail finding accomodations for a family with 4 RVs who had -- months earlier -- reserved 4 campsites together. For some odd reason (probably having to do with the alignment of the moon and stars) the owner had moved two of the reservations to two different areas of the campground, and had canceled another one of them entirely! After finally finding 4 sites together that the family was content (barely) with, one of them discovered that the sewer hookup at his campsite was clogged. I realized that the last thing this group needed was one more delay. I reached into the sewer pipe and cleaned it out by hand.

As I washed up at the office I remembered something: Hadn't I written a "trouble ticket" on that clogged sewer line two months earlier? Sure enough, I had! Why was I the only person who cared about satisfying our guests??? I wrote a strongly-worded note on the trouble ticket and taped it to the owner's computer screen. The next morning she fired me (I guess you can fire an unpaid volunteer!), using language that I had never even heard my father (a merchant marine) use.

A few weeks ago the owner of the campground called me to ask if I'd help open the campground for the season. She assured me that some major "stressors" in her life were now settled, and that she would be much easier to work for. I doubted that she would be that much different (she wasn't), but I showed up (as an unpaid volunteer, as before) and brought in a work camper who hustled from dawn to well past dusk for very little pay. I was hoping that the owner would see the value of keeping a couple of people (one free, the other dirt-cheap) who were willing to do whatever it took to open her campground. (My bad. She didn't.)

She must have had a really bad night last night, because this morning she came into the office looking for a fight to pick...even more than usual. She lashed out at me more than once, and I let her know that her verbal abuse wasn't appreciated. She responded, "Well then, let's just end it right now." I suppose she thought I'd beg her to let me stay on as her unpaid doormat.

I didn't.

So...now I'm at Bandits Roost campground near Wilkesboro. Next Monday I start my volunteer work for MerleFest. The festival ends Sunday, May 2. After that, who knows? I'd love to find a campground that would really appreciate someone who takes guest relations seriously.