Josh, Philip, Ally and Tracey May at Niagara Falls. (Philip May)
Crazy is one word for it.
The guy walks away from a middle-management job at Hewlett-Packard, moves his wife and two kids out of their Almaden Valley home, loads them into a 37-foot RV and hits the road. The plan? Well, on the road you have time to figure out little details like that.
"We sort of jumped into it without thinking about it too much," says Philip May, 47. He's on the phone from the Oasis Las Vegas RV Resort, a few miles from the strip. His family as been crisscrossing the country for three-plus years. "I think if I would have thought about it too much I wouldn't have done it."
But now he's glad he did.
May, wife Tracey, daughter Ally, 14, and son Josh, 12, have shared the adventure of a lifetime.
They've seen the country. The kids have flourished through their home-school (or mobile-home school) education. Tracey and Philip have started a mobile, RV-based business. (OK, they're on their third business, but this one, Philip says, has legs.) And more important than any of that, the family has grown closer together than they ever thought possible.
Don't believe me? When was the last time you heard a 14-year-old girl say this about her 12-year-old sibling? "My brother is the most important person to me. He knows all my secrets. He knows all about me."
So, how did this happen? Back in the summer of 2006, Silicon Valley was strangling Philip and Tracey. The valley can do that to you. It's all about getting ahead, beating the other guy. It can become about work for work's sake.
HP, where Philip managed various partnerships, wasn't the same company he once loved. It had been through several convulsions. There was the Compaq merger. Mark Hurd arrived as CEO. There were layoffs, shifting priorities.
Tracey had already given up her sales manager's job at Mentor Graphics. She'd been exhibiting signs of stress. She says her doctor told her, "You really need a life change."
So why not make a big one? The couple always had wanted to see the country. Philip took a buyout. The couple rented out their house, bought a Dolphin motor home and set off to find a better place to live.
"It surprised me a little bit," says Nigel Ball, a friend and one of May's HP bosses. "I thought, 'It will probably last a few weeks.' "
"You can look out the window and see the peaks of Zion," Philip says, recalling a day in the home office at Zion National Park. "I might not earn anything near what I used to earn, but to look at a view like that ..."
The freedom of the road does have its downsides. Josh sorely missed his San Jose friends in the beginning. Both kids still find it difficult now when they make friends on the road, knowing it's temporary. Sure, they text and exchange e-mail, but as Ally says, "the reality is you might never see them again."
Then there's the living space — or lack of it. The RV is close quarters for a family of four — and a dog. But being together, really together, has paid off in the long run, Tracey says.
"When we lived in the Bay Area, to be honest," she says, "the weekends tended to be a mad dash of taking the kids to this activity and to that activity and socializing with friends."
Everyone was scattered. Now the Mays have meals together — even breakfast. There's plenty of time to talk — and, more important, listen. Philip and Tracey have come to know their children better — what they like, what they want, what they need. They've realized recently that as Josh and Ally tumble deeper into adolescence that they're at an age where they need more stability. It's time to find a less nomadic lifestyle.
"I'm glad we did it," Josh says, "but I'd like to settle down now.''
That should happen this year. The Mays plan to sell their San Jose house and buy a campground where they will live more satisfied, more open to adventure and more in tune with each other.
Maybe it's not so crazy after all.
Contact Mike Cassidy at mcassidy@mercurynews.com or 408-920-5536. Follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/mikecassidy.
