Funny how a two-hour plane ride can take you to places you never could have imagined. Or perhaps, never wanted to imagine. Las Vegas is that sort of destination, an oxymoron in every sense of the word.
Vegas is billed as an oasis in the middle of the desert. While there is water flowing freely from every water feature, shark tank, shower and toilet in a city of over a million tourists and residents, people are forced to bathe and drink brown water processed from the waste.
As our plane dropped out of the sky above this mysterious metropolis, our senses were jolted by the transition from crystal blue skies and white snow-capped peaks to the monochromatic dirty browns of the mountains and valley floor. As the plane descended further, we could see the glaring pink and gold sunlight bouncing off the reflective windows of the skyscrapers, their brilliance in harsh juxtaposition to the miles of ticky-tacky brown houses that snaked around the city center like a den of slithering serpents. Nary a spot of green grass or palm grove could be seen. The only green glimpsed over a four-day Vegas weekend was on the outfield at the softball tournament we had come to watch or in the handful of hundreds tossed onto casino crap tables as casually as leaves fluttering to the ground.
Vegas is billed as sin city, where the largest source of revenue comes from gambling, alcohol, drugs and the sex industry. Like Oregon, they too have added marijuana to the list of legal drugs, deepening their dependence on addictive substances to maintain their economy. No oxymoron with that marketing tagline, whereas its billing as the entertainment capital of the world is as fake as the headliners’ faces, stretched grotesquely into masks from face lifts gone awry or a maze of Botox filled wrinkles from chin to brow.
Fremont Street is lined 24-hours a day with has-been and want-to-be performers, a sprinkling of truly talented musicians, dancers and vocalists, and an abundance of drug addicts and prostitutes. Some performers are trying to feed their families, but most are simply trading tips from their one-hour act in a three-foot circle painted on the street for a line of coke.
You feel dirty, like a person at a freak show if you stop to watch the Snake Man contort into an 18-inch cube, the Fremont Fairy dance for dimes or the angelic faced woman in a nun’s habit pose for pictures while fantasy seekers fondle her voluptuous assets.
The Golden Nugget, where we stayed, was never peaceful. Its slot machine and neon lights never stopped flashing. The din of a thousand revelers served as a base for the high-pitched wailing of police and fire sirens. Car alarms blared throughout the night as valets searched throughout the parking garage for their customer’s car. The pair of foam earplugs provided by the hotel were as useless placed in your ears as left on the bedside table. With over three and a half million visitors to the city each month, there is never a moment of quiet and solitude.
Even the Martin Luther King Jr. parade, a demonstration meant to honor the life of peaceful protest personified by the Reverend, ended in a riot on our Fremont Street doorstep, mounted police breaking up fights between marchers and violent protestors.
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You can tell Vegas is not my fantasy destination. I find the city’s focus on glitz and glitter merely a mirage in the desert, a magician’s smoke and mirrors to hide the dark underbelly of the people being exploited in an ever-escalating quest for extravagance.
You might ask, if I feel so uncomfortable in this environment, why in the world would I go there? That is a valid question. Vegas is worth visiting if it is hosting a winter softball tournament in which my granddaughter and her team are competing. We spent most of our time on the softball fields, under a brilliant blue sky, surrounded by spectacular mountain ranges in the company of some amazing athletes and supportive parents.
This year, we were treated to some games when our entire team excelled and only an inning or two when the fielders fell apart. Every player had a great at bat and an exceptional defensive play. And yes, this will embarrass our granddaughter, but grandparents get bragging rights. Aunika never missed a ball in the field or at bat. She started the tournament with an over the fence homerun, erasing the tainted Vegas experience from our minds. She improved with every game, garnering more hits and RBIs, first base saves, sneaky steals and foul ball fly outs. This was the exceptional Vegas entertainment we came down to see.
The last day of the tournament, we were physically pummeled by 50-mile-an-hour winds that imbedded infield pebbles in your eyes and teeth. High desert country is cold in January.
We warmed our frozen toes and fingers by dogpiling into the compact rental car, shoe-horning Katie McNerney and her dad, Kevin, into the back seat with Aunika and Grandpa Flip. With some other unusual antics emerging from this can of sarcastic sardines, we hooted our way back to the hotel, emerging like circus clowns from the one of those trick little VW bugs. (What happens in the Vegas clown car must stay in Vegas.)
Between dogpiles, party revelers, long airport lines, security checks, miles of concourses, heavy bags and airplanes bursting at the seams, our aging bodies were severely tested. We were exhausted.
As the plane descended into the Portland Airport, we couldn’t help but be thankful that we were back in Oregon. It was a dark and stormy night. Rain was coming down in sheets, the wind was howling, the airplane traffic was deafening. Unlike in Vegas, all of the Oregon uproar could be ignored. We were heading home, to a valley where the grass was still green, the rivers ran clean and, for the most part, people really cared about one another.
Oxymoronically, we felt exhaustedly invigorated. Hood River is no Garden of Eden, but it is a far cry from Sin City.
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