Ramblings about summer ramblings

(Note: This column may ramble a little but it’s basically about rambling, so that’s OK.)
As you read this writing Tammy and I are hopefully off for our first real vacation trip in at least three years. In fact, since the beginning of the year 2022 we have not traveled on what I would call a pleasure trip more than 200 miles from our home more than once in all that time. But a few weeks ago, seeing that summer was quickly passing by, we made the decision to hit the road and spend a few days in one of our favorite spots within a day’s drive of where we now live —Branson, Mo.
Why, you may be asking, would you want to go anywhere south in the hottest month of the year? Before I get to the answer to that, let me say the thought has crossed my mind as well and it takes me back to a column I read many years ago by the late great American humorist, Art Buchwald. His piece was all about vacations and holidays and he asked why anyone would go on a vacation after the summer equinox when the days are getting shorter? (He also pondered why two major holidays—Christmas and New Year’s—are spaced a week apart and in the dead of winter. I mean, couldn’t we move one of them to give us a break around, say, the first of May? But that’s a column for another day.)
To get back to your question about the timing of this trip, well, it just comes down to when the time was available and the dust had settled a bit from all the upheaval in our lives back in May. It also has to do with the relatively short distance to the destination and some things we want to do while we’re there. (More on that coming up.)
Part of my love for traveling goes back to when I was growing up on the farm in Tripp County, when traveling vacations were a possibility on the same order as dining with the president or riding in a submarine. Where my dad was concerned it just wasn’t going to happen.
Ray Burtz’s idea of a vacation was to spend three or four days in the Black Hills during the SDEA teachers’ convention that in those days always took place around the third week in September and meant a four-day weekend off from school. The first time I ever traveled to another state besides Nebraska where my Aunt Doris lived was when my older cousins started getting married. That wasn’t until the early 70s and meant weekend trips to exotic locations like Creston, Iowa and Somelittletown, Minn.
If we begged him to go some place really cool like Yellowstone, Dad would say, “Well, we can’t go there because the bears would eat your mom, ‘cause she’s my honey!” (Groan! Defeat and a bad dad pun.)
Even in my teens my travels tended to be pretty limited. I did actually get to leave the country when I was in early high school years when my brother took several of us boys to Canada on a canoe trip as our Youth For Christ director. But the first time I ever flew commercial I was in my early 20s (to Kansas City) and the first time I saw an ocean was when I was 25 (the Pacific).
So, to get back to the subject of this column, our first big trip in more than three years (I told you this one would ramble!), we are heading for Branson, a place our family has enjoyed visiting for more than 20 years. After making our first trip to Silver Dollar City in 2002 we were hooked, and since it was only about 5 and a half hours away from our then home in Illinois, it was a great place to go even for a long weekend.
One of the surprising things to anyone who knew me when I was a kid might be that shortly after my first trip to Silver Dollar City I became a first-class roller coaster freak. Sometimes it surprises even me because when I was a kid going to the Labor Day carnival in my home town, I never rode anything that went higher than a Tilt-a-Whirl until I was almost a junior in high school (and then only because I didn’t want to embarrass myself in front of my high school girlfriend). More than a fear of heights, I was always freaked out by coasters that had loops that turned you upside down, but today one of my favorite rides is a coaster that has no less than five of them!
For the more sedate traveler, the Branson area has lots of other attractions including world class entertainment on the strip, museums and attractions, boating and fishing on Table Rock Lake, great dining, the College of the Ozarks (known as Hard Work U) and many, many other activities for the whole family.
But... I’m not here to sell you a timeshare in the Ozarks, so I’ll conclude my ramblings with this. The most important message of this column is that it’s important to get away from the humdrum of everyday life once in a while to see some different country and take time for rest and recreation. Taking a trip like that can help one gain a whole new perspective and a recharge for tackling the challenges of life in this old world. I know in my own life, some of the most important decisions I’ve made have come after such a getaway.
So before summer completely slips away from us, why not schedule a few days and hit the road for a change of scenery? Who knows? If nothing else, it just might make you glad to be home again, and that could be a good thing.
RON BURTZ can be reached at newsregister@hamilton.net