The City

Las Vegas is a jewel in the midst of a lot of brown. More brown then you can name. Even if you are an interior decorator, but they know all kinds of things that no one should know, like what kind of curtians one should have in a room meant to wash out your undies, so we will ignore them for the moment. All that most people know of the city is that you can gamble and supposedly, it never sleeps. Just try and get a pizza delivered at 6am and you will see how wrong that is. The only parts of Vegas that never sleep are the ones that cater to the outsiders on The Strip. Though a few locals get caught in the web, of course. And it is damned convenient to know that if you really have to have Thai food at four in the morning, and you are willing to brave The Strip Zombies, you can get it. Las Vegas is a city of contrasts. Neon and Old West fight for dominance with neither really winning the day, but never giving up the fight either. It breaths and flows. A smiling face with no soul on one side and a harsh landscape ready to show you the depth of your own if you aren't careful, on the other.

I love my City. It embraces me and holds me close. It is insanity taken to extremes and made acceptable. Where Mormons out-number just about any other religious faith and the mainstay is profiting off the worse in human nature. One just has to admire its balls in continuing to exist regardless of the doomsayers that predict its downfall.

When driving around the edges of the valley, it is hard to not love this place..the lights..the energy..the hope and dispair..all muddled together into a fantasy made real..as long as you don't look behind the curtain. You have to want to believe in this place and no matter how cynical I see people become from dealing with the dispair that comes from hoping too much...wanting too long that big win...they still stay. You can see it in their eyes...They are hooked. They stay because they know that they won't find anywhere close to the same life that they have here. Las Vegas is alive like no other city I have ever been in. It calls to the traveler as they pass over the mountains. Its sings to the weary as they wander up and down the streets, getting filled to the brim with $1.99 breakfast specials. It holds and comforts those that pretend the West was never conquered as they sleep and dream of open plains and wandering Indians. The mountains rise up on all sides and make a nest. A place like a womb. Where it is ok to indulge your dark ideas and grab for the brass ring, no matter that it is well out of reach and shiny-new from other failed attempts. And that comforts you when the inevitable happens and you fall flat, close to broken. My City's soul is deep and layered. Hard and welcoming. Unforgiving but ever-indulgent. Dull, dusty, and consistent, with untold enchantments, and an ebb and flow that makes the oceans look still.

To be able to see the beauty in a drive-up wedding chapel and the sight of the sky just lightening over the Eastern mountains is to know this place. The Gods walked here once. And the impressions they left behind, so hard and incomprehensible to our simple senses, could have only resulted in a place like this. Las Vegas doesn't care if it is loved or not. Appreciated or not. It exists for its own self. It is confident in itself, not seeking identity from any other source. It knows itself well and tolerates the meandering of others, because in the end, their words and actions mean nothing to it. The City will always be....since when the Paiutes saw it as an oasis until the Mob saw its potential profit. Las Vegas is a Mecca of glitter, greed, strength and hopeless desire. It will promise you the world and give you a two-for-one comp ticket and the wonder of it all is, you will be happy about it.

Viva, Las Vegas!