My Money Story – Part IV – Family Vacations

I think in every FI journey there comes a specific point in time – that Aha moment – when we realize that the current trajectory of our lives will forever change.  We’ve identified a clarity in which we decide to alter our paths and pursue a new reality. 

However, the farther we travel along in this new journey, we begin to reflect on how it is that we arrived at this destination (sometimes earlier and sometimes later).  We start to look back to our childhood… to the beginning… and wonder what early events shaped us into who we have become today.  What decisions did we cast, moments that we pivoted and chances that we grasped that caught us up in the tangled webs that we weave. 

And that has led me to today’s post, part IV of my ongoing series – My Money Story – in which I delve into the bygone memories from a life already lived, fated and decided up until this point.  In the previous three segments, I discuss my earliest memory of money, initial fear of debt and first jobs, but today I get to what I think is the meat of the genesis of my money story: 

Observation and watchfulness. 

When I try to deconstruct, what was one of the main turning points for my money story, there isn’t a single moment that comes to mind, but rather a culmination over time of specific life experiences that remained constant throughout the years – how we spent our family vacations together. 

And simply observing these relatively brief two-week periods every summer, has given me more answers than I think all the other years combined ever could. 

But let me give you some context first. 

I grew up as the middle child in a family of five (that should explain a lot – haha, why is it always the middle kids turn so wild?)  My sister and I were only a year and half apart while my little brother was eight years my junior.  Our family wasn’t poor, but I wouldn’t have considered us wealthy by any stretch of the means either.  My dad worked as a med-tech at a local hospital as a hematologist (basically they study blood) and my mom was a part-time nursery schoolteacher prior to becoming a stay-at-home mom to raise all three of us children.  So, we basically lived off one middle class salary in a high cost of living neighborhood in North East Los Angeles. 

That being said, I realize now how great my parents had been with their money.  They would not agree with me, but based on their decisions, I feel like they had a knack for making modest amounts of money go a long way.  They also made some big sacrifices that delayed their own retirement quite a bit by sending all three of us to private elementary and high schools (how they managed this with their incomes, I’m not sure).  If they would have forgone those choices and sent us to public school, I think they easily could have been early retirees since they didn’t live a lavish lifestyle.  But I digress – I’ll get into all this stuff later on in this series. 

So back to my topic at hand – how did we spend family vacations together? 

Because in my opinion, there was no better way to observe and learn how my parents interacted with money, than by analyzing the family vacations we took as a child growing up.  Watching how did my parents actually spend the money that they earned when leisure opportunities presented themselves.

So what did we do? 

It was simple.  From my earliest childhood memory, we would take road trips every summer from LA to either Boulder, CO or Spokane, WA to visit my younger cousins.  We’d always stay a night in Cedar City, UT for the Boulder trip and Bend, OR for the Spokane trip.  And boy oh boy did my parents love Bend, OR – and this was the Bend of old as well as the Boulder of old.  I was recently in Bend two years ago and holy shit has it changed and grown so much!  Where the fuck did that Old Mill District come from?  And Boulder even more so – I still remember it as the small college town at the foothill of the Rockies rather than the rich tech hub it has blossomed into. 

But that’s what happens with change.  The world keeps on turning and we either adjust or we don’t. 

Did we stay in extravagant luxury along the way?  Nope.  I think we started off in Motel 6 and then eventually upgraded to Best Western hotels.  I remember once in a while we got to stay in a Red Lion hotel in Redding, CA and both my sister and I thought it was the epitome of luxury.  Hahaha.  Ahhhh, to be young again. 

Our transportation was an old red VW bus in the early days.  I recall the air conditioning rarely worked and we broke down in the desert.  Not fun in the sweltering Las Vegas heat… hahaha.  But we were young and fearless, right?  Then we upgraded to the Ford Aerostar van, not sitting in the lap of luxury by any means, but it got the job done.  And really, that was all we needed.  Ourselves and simple transportation and we were all set. 

And I truly looked forward to these two week vacations every year.  When I step back and look at it, these were very budget conscious trips.  You’re paying for maybe 2-3 hotel nights and then staying with family.  So for a ten day stretch you’re only spending on food and activities, plus we did a lot of outdoor recreation that didn’t cost anything.  And subconsciously, I think I soaked all this up as a kid and it greatly influenced how I learned to think about money.  When you begin your life with simple living, you learn to make the most of the little things in life. 

Plus, it wasn’t just the low cost that stayed with me.  It was the type of trips we took.  We weren’t flying from point A to point B – jet setting internationally across the world (which there is nothing wrong with.  If you have the means, do it.  But we didn’t.)  We were putting the miles on the road that it took for most people to make a cross state journey back then – constantly stopping and exploring – making the most out of the time and resources we had.  For better or worse, we were all stuck in a car together.  We were family.  Plus, I was able to sit in the back seat and watch the natural landscape slowly pass by, understanding how the change in geography gradually took shape.  This was a new concept for me as a kid, seeing there were still undeveloped pristine landscapes that man hadn’t touched yet. 

Open space?  What was that? 

I remember when we would drive from Boulder to Denver, and in only a few minutes all you could see were rolling hills and trees in different shades of green stretching out as far as the eye could see.  And this blew my mind.  Because as a kid growing up in LA, we didn’t have open space.  Almost everything was developed.  And the open space you would get to, was usually desert and places that no one would ever want to be. 

So when I take a moment to contrast my vacations as a kid compared to the fast-paced 24/7 technological world of today, I’m still pretty amazed at the simplicity of it.  We can never return to the past, but we can always learn from it. 

And as a kid it taught me, you don’t need extravagant vacations to be happy.  A simple road trip in a van to spend two weeks with your cousins was all that was necessary, and what I preferred.  It also taught me that family was about the relationships, we take care of our own.  But more importantly, you find the time, and take the time, to spend it with the people you love the most.  If you aren’t doing that, then life is probably slipping through your fingertips.  Seek out that which gives you the greatest joy and live blissfully.  Your leisure time doesn’t need to be filled with expensive things or activities.  It is the people you surround yourself with that will matter the most in the long run. 

So, when I think back to being a young kid in school, you always heard that rich kid bragging about the expensive vacation they went on – international travel, resorts, exotic beaches, yachts…  the list goes on and on.  Man, that would be cool, I’d always think. 

But now I have the gift of perspective, and I understand what a profound effect those early family vacations had on building the bridge from who I was, to who I am today.  And I’m both grateful and thankful for the lessons learned and the simple trips I was able to take with my family with the time we had. 

So here’s to family… may you find the time to share, what time you have – thoughtfully, conscientiously and happily. 

-Q-FI 

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P.S.  When was the last time you took a road trip, and lost yourself staring through the glass?  Or what were family vacations like for yourself as a child?  If you were lucky enough to have a family to take them with.