Commentary

My husband and I sat sullenly in the holding pen timeshare sales office, awaiting the exchange of 90 minutes of our life for theme park tickets. We were going to say no. It’s easy to say no to a vacation mortgage at a 17% interest rate when we can barely afford the mortgage on the house in which we actually lived.

As we were ushered into the sales office, we were overwhelmed by electric blue paint on the wall, the spiky conversation of marketing agents, and LCD screens flashing images of blissful travelers. And…Jimmy Buffett.

In song form, at least. Buffett was on a neverending loop on the loudspeakers: Someone had purchased a five-CD changer and a box set, and they were going to use it.

More’s the pity for the salesman. My husband sat next to him, facing one of the TV screens, and drank in the feed of condo floor plans and I sat across, mentally and utterly gone. This wasn’t tourist-special, lite-radio “Margaritaville” and “Five o’ Clock Somewhere,” this was back-catalog stuff not even heard on tour, the seldom-heard little tracks buried on albums originally released as, well, albums.

So over me swirled “owner’s fee” and “exchange weeks” and “points accrued,” but I was floating on a sea of “Migration” and “Somewhere Over China.” Trying to argue us into staying another hour and a half for a property tour? Sorry, I’m too busy mentally singing along with “Frank and Lola.” At one point, the salesman ducked away to have a “Manager’s Chat,” and I leaned over to my husband to address the other issue which had been amusing me all afternoon.

“What’s going to happen,” I said, “when the CD spits out ‘Why Don’t We Get Drunk and Screw?’”

God is good and saw to it that I had an answer to my question, which is: There will be sudden footsteps across the front office and a very loud silence right after the first chorus concludes, after which Buffett will never appear again.

I’ve heard that good people can make the worst job fun. Sometimes, though, good music can make the longest sales pitch bearable.

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