On our way from the Grand Canyon to San Diego we somehow found ourselves in Las Vegas. Truth is, we didn’t want to do the 8+ hours on the road to SD all in one day, so we figured we’d stay overnight someplace like Barstow, CA. As we drove across Arizona on I-40, we saw signs telling us Las Vegas was 115 miles away, then 90---and suddenly Barstow wasn’t seeming like much of a draw. We'd been thinking Vegas was further out of our way than 90 miles. So we pulled off at the intersection of I-40 and Hwy 93 and did some quick internet searching. (You’ve gotta love having the internet in your pocket these days.) The famous “Circus Circus” Casino, hilariously billed as "kid friendly," had rooms with perks for $39—cheaper than a Motel 6. It’d just be one night, it’d be an experience, and the alternative was Barstow. So we went for it.
On the way you can't miss the Hoover Dam, which was wonderfully impressive. We were surprised at what a tourist attraction it is. So many people stopping and touring and shooting pictures. Quite the chaotic scene. And then came Vegas. And Vegas is…well, Vegas.
As if this isn’t apparent to anyone within 100 feet of me, I’m a nerd in more than a few ways. My momma raised me with good, meddling morals, and to this day I struggle with being places like New Orleans’ Bourbon Street and the Vegas strip. I feel like I’m not supposed to be there—and while some people find that feeling exhilarating and it inspires them to fits of rebellious wildness that include serious drinking and tattoos and other things I won't mention on a g-rated blog, it just makes me feel guilty. I felt guilty as we checked in, I felt guilty as we hung around the hotel, I felt guilty as we checked out the casino… While walking our way down the strip, we stepped over countless small paper ads scattered for unknown reasons on the sidewalk, with each piece of paper showing a scantily (or not-at-all) clad woman advertising something, though I couldn’t tell what. With Nan and the kids present, I couldn’t bend over to examine them more carefully (to determine the product being advertised, of course), but just the same, I felt guilty for being there, with those ads.
Would the kids be corrupted forever by our short visit to Vegas? No, and neither would I. But I just can’t bring myself to let go and have fun. I’d be the perfect character for one of those movies where I’m somehow trapped in a cross-country venture with a woman of ill-repute who eventually corrupts my morals in an endearing way and we fall in love and live happily ever after (or at least until my nerdiness reasserts itself and she takes off with the bartender from “The Scurvy Dog Bar and Grill” down the street from where we’d no doubt be living. But I digress…)
We’d planned to gamble a set amount, something else that makes me feel guilty when I consider the world’s needs, but then decided we’d spend most of our intended gambling money on a gift I can’t describe here lest its recipient find out what we bought. Suffice it to say, we were left with about $20 total to use in testing our luck, and about half of that we let the kids spend in what turned out to be a pretty good lesson in losing. They put about $8 in quarters into various attempts at winning and wound up with 10 rubber balls and 11 Tootsie Pop suckers. (At the end, they wished we’d have just given them the $8 to spend at Target.) Nan and I dropped our few dollars into the slot machines, winning only enough to keep us going for a while longer than held our interest. In retrospect, we should have dropped it into something like lottery tickets that could have paid off in a big way if they hit, but it was an interesting experience just being in a big-time casino so we aren't complaining. We also enjoyed the Circus Circus circus acts (going every 15 minutes), the buffet dinner (which left us stuffed like turkeys), and the swanky room (which the kids said beat the Motel 6 and Travelodge by a mile, though to me a motel room is a motel room). We saw famous casinos while walking the strip at night (if 8pm constitutes night) and enjoyed all the excitement and people. And then we got up and made the drive to San Diego. Here, in a nice state park on a reservoir, we’re more in our element and I don’t feel like quite as big a nerd or at all guilty. We can hike and build fires and write blogs and not have to feel like we’re corrupting our kids.
I think today’s school work will have a lesson or two on honesty to try and neutralize the effects of Vegas. I mean, what’s parenting if we can’t pass on our nerdiness and guilt to our kids?
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