Work Life Play With Aaron Mchugh

We did the deal in a McDonald’s parking lot half a mile from the Portland airport after a 20-minute test drive and a rusty glove inspection. It took $6,700, four plane tickets and six months of looking for her. The Joy Bus was ours. The story began when my daughter Averi blurted out this dreamy statement, “When I graduate from high school, Maya and I are going to buy a VW Bus, road-trip to California and surf for the summer.” After more banter about this idea, we began to think, Why not? Averi is our youngest of three children. With Averi’s older brother, I would have likely offered a litany of logical facts as to how improbable dreams of surfing the Cali coast would be for two 18-year-olds. The truth is, I wasn’t always willing to embrace the wonder of big, audacious dreams. Nor was I fanning the flame of our children’s dreams to muse about what lies beyond tomorrow. After 20 years of practice, trials and mistakes, I am becoming a much better father. Averi and I started riffing on the idea of finding a Bus a