Always Leave Them Wanting More

When I was twelve years old my mother took me and my younger brother to Hawaii to meet my father who had been traveling in Asia with the Xavier Cugat band. We stayed for one week at a small motel in Waikiki.  By now a fifty-story hotel has undoubtedly risen from that same small plot of land.

While in Honolulu we toured the Dole pineapple plantation where I was treated to what felt like Christmas in April.  Sweet, delicious pineapple. The sight of it. The scent of it. The taste of it in unlimited quantities. And it was all free.

There were fountains from which no water flowed, just pineapple juice. Not from a can that cost eighteen cents, but from a pineapple juice fountain!  Free. This was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for a fat, ravenous young boy who didn’t have nearly enough money to pay for everything he wanted. I ate pineapple. I drank pineapple. I bathed in the pineapple juice which covered my face, neck, and sticky hands.

You can probably imagine what happened next. Thanks to my pineapple binge I couldn’t stand the sight or taste of that cloying tropical fruit for many years. Even the thought of pineapple juice chased my appetite to never-never land. At Dole I simply had too much.

Dole was generous.  Too generous.  They completely ignored the basic show business adage that you should always leave your audience wanting more. If you think they will sit still for twenty songs, sing fifteen. TED Talks are strictly limited to eighteen minutes, not an hour and a half.  If you’ve ever fallen asleep in class you know exactly why.

Ever since my pineapple splurge as a twelve-year-old, I’ve applied my Dole lesson in many ways. If I think I would enjoy two weeks of vacation, I plan nine days. I eat at my favorite restaurant less often than I think I might prefer.  I don’t turn on my TV set for every soccer game, though I have been taking in more than a few World Cup games from Brazil.

Let’s have lunch once a month, not twice.  When my children were young I bought them candy at the market, but not every time. Whenever I am tempted to overindulge I remember the Showbiz mantra.  Well, not every time.  Today I gobbled down two (small) hamburgers for lunch.  I won’t touch another hamburger for a week or two.

In the interest of your own future enjoyment, you might consider showbiz wisdom and leave yourself wanting more.  You might also leave others wanting more, including more of you.

Years ago I asked a Texan “How did you like our three hour dinner?”

“Waahl,” he drawled, “Ah feel like the monkey who made love to the skunk.”

He paused for dramatic effect. “Ah enjoyed about as much as Ah could stand.”

Enjoy yourself, and your life, in moderation.

Why do I aim to limit my blog entries to six hundred words?  To leave you wanting more, not less.  This one is five hundred fourteen words.

Alan