Issue link: https://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/517095
Traveling on Route 66 from Chicago to Los Angeles is like driving more than 2,000 miles through a living postcard of neon signs, mom-and-pop diners and quirky roadside attractions. It is not, for all the encroaching pressures of our fast-paced world, the domain of chain restaurants and super-mega-everything- but-the-kitchen-sink retailers. It was in that place Kevin and Nancy Mueller, both 1984 graduates, found themselves in 2011 – after they both were laid off from their corporate jobs. "Like a lot of people my age – middle management, lower-level executives – they decide they don't need you or your office," says Kevin. "That was when the door was open for us to think outside the box. I guess a little bit of the entrepreneurial side was coming out of me." After being downsized, Kevin says he went on a soul-searching trip, and his thoughts wandered to the independent businesses along Route 66, where his family had traveled just a few years prior. Kevin presented the idea that they sell their house in Brighton and buy the Blue Swallow Motel in Tucumcari, New Mexico. A 12-room motel, the Blue Swallow first opened on Route 66 in 1939. Gorgeous desert sunsets compete with the motel's kitschy electric sign that still proudly proclaims: "100% refrigerated air." "I didn't say what I wanted to say," Nancy says. "That was the first bit of enthusiasm I had heard in his voice in weeks." How an alumni couple found fulfillment on Route 66 Route 66 and its anti-corporate vibe turned out to be an ideal solution to mark the end of their rat race affair. "It kind of gets under your skin a bit," says Kevin. "It's the open road stretches where you're reminded of what it was like to drive on a two-lane highway. You just don't see that along the interstate, where everything is the same, and every off-ramp has the same hotels and the same restaurants, and you forget which town you're in because everything looks the same. Route 66 is the anti-that. "It's all about an America that's not homogenous. It's what makes this for us very rewarding. We're not only preserving a property that's historic … we're also preserving a way of life." Kevin says the motel's design invites travelers to sit out and chat with one another, and several have stayed connected with the Muellers and have written about the Blue Swallow's welcoming and peaceful vibe. "We try to create this atmosphere almost of stepping back in time to a different time when you engaged your fellow travelers," he says. "You didn't travel 900 miles in one day in air conditioned comfort. You maybe did 200 miles sweating your butt off." The couple, now along with their son Cameron and his wife, Jessica, treat guests to nights under the stars roasting marshmallows before the travelers bunk down in rooms outfitted with rotary phones and pink stucco walls. In the morning, they wake up refreshed, ready for whatever lies ahead on the stretch known as the Mother Road. > Kevin and Nancy Mueller 10 centralight spring '15