Viva Las Vegas!!
Viva Las Vegas!!
It didn’t take much. Michael and John Henry and I were sitting at the Wing Nutz sports bar a few Fridays ago, waiting for our dinners. I pulled out a handbill that I‘d seized at Sugarhouse Coffee for “Viva Las Vegas” Rockabilly and Car Show weekend extravaganza at the Orleans hotel. Mike, after 1.3 seconds, said “ARE WE GOING??” as if it were entirely up to me, as if I wouldn’t need to check in with my accountability partner! A lively discussion ensued, and we had tickets booked on Southwest that night.
I collected polka dots for the big 50’s style
event. Pin-up contest, couples vintage
swimwear contest, swing dance contest, special music by the Polecats, Brian
Setzer, and Dick Dale - surf guitar king!
I needed polka dots! Lots of
them!!
Leavetaking day began smoothly, but we encountered a
short delay when TSA decided Mike needed his backpack searched, to his
dismay. He fretted and fumed and I
cracked jokes while they rifled through his things, only to eventually discover
a bottle of sunblock that he'd hastily tossed in at the last moment. Absolutely no liquids onboard, Michael. As we
buckled in for takeoff, full of Vegas optimism and false hope, we talked about
all the fun in which we would inevitably partake in the City of Ribaldry. We had dinner reservations for that evening
at Kumi, our emerging favorite restaurant at our definitive favorite hotel,
Mandalay Bay.
We
arrived, dropped our bags in the room and headed down for gaming and a stiff
drink. We sat down at the bar and fed
the video poker machine. Five coins
later, I hit this:
It’s the only time I’ve ever seen a royal flush. Odds of hitting a royal flush (assuming perfect play on the draw) are one in 40,390!!
The
polka dots were definitely working in my favor because the royal flush wasn’t
even the best thing that happened that day!
We
had a beautiful dinner that night at Kumi -- sushi, hand roll, and delicious toban
filet from Chef Akira Back. And when
dinner was finished, Michael turned to me and told me once again how much he
loves me, that I’ve changed his life for the better, and it was time to take the next
step. “This is it,” he said, as I looked
at him breathlessly. He slid out of the
booth, got down on one knee, flashed a beautiful ring, and asked me to marry
him. And I said YESH.
 |
| Right before dinner.... |
Life is always changing. Some of those changes are excruciating. But I know that God is good and that He cares for His children and blesses them, even though they make mistakes and stumble around in this life. Michael and I were crazy about each other from the beginning, though at times during our journey we were not sure that we could be together. But we never gave up. Just like all of you who have made marriage work, we found ways to slough off the bad and claim the good. We were willing to let go of some things that might have meant the end in another time and place, or if we were different people. We both always wanted this to work. We were colleagues for years, then beer buddies, then friends, then sweethearts. Sometimes back to friends again. Sometimes we didn’t speak for a while. There were times I had to let him go. He says he never gave up on me. But we believed in each other’s goodness, and our trust and partnership has blossomed. It isn’t easy to fuse two full lives each with 50+ years of independent history. We grew our time together quite intentionally, till it got to where we really really wanted it. We chose it. I am so grateful for him, and it is my great honor and pleasure to become his wife.
Things are somewhat of a blur after that, but late that night I was playing my favorite penny slot when it experienced a MALFUNCTION in the middle of 50 free games! I waited for it to resurrect, but this was a serious glitch, and apparently all the Bally machines in the casino went down at once and weren’t coming back. I’ve never seen this happen before. The slot manager told me she would cash out my $7 credit till I pointed out that I had about $80 racked up and 30 free games to go. She came back around a while later and said she would give me $150. I reminded her again I had 30 games to go, and told her I wanted $200 if she didn’t want me to get mad and never come back. Guess what? $200! It’s hard to win a negotiation based on a theoretical outcome but I was well-positioned and very convincing. As a software engineer, my logic is impeccable, and I do my best work at 4 am.In the morning, we rolled out of bed and went out to the “beach”, newly fiancé and fiancée. The “beach” at Mandalay Bay has sand and chairs and sun and a wave pool. There is also a “toptional” section which is $50 to enter! Seems steep for…. anyway, we lay in the sun and cooled in the pool and Mike set himself right with a beer but I couldn’t even look at the stuff. After a while I recovered enough that we could move along to the Rockabilly concert and Car show!
That
night after the show, we wandered around, happy in our world, seeking our
fortune. It never found me. Who did find me is Toni Hall, a young lost
woman asking the way back to the MGM Grand.
She had been kicked out of the Coyote Bar she said, lost her friend
group, and had no cel phone. We pointed and
pontificated till it became apparent that she was too inebriated to walk, let
alone follow directions. And she was
English, from the Midlands, so I owed her big.
The Brits were just lovely to us all for the entire year we occupied our
roomy home on Bartholomew Way in Horsham, West Sussex. They hold a special place in my heart, and in
my children’s hearts. Plus you have to
be a special kind of wild to get kicked out of the Coyote Bar. So I said to Mike, let’s go, we are walking
her back to the MGM. We got on each side
of her, and wrapped her up in our arms and held her up and she kissed on us
(mostly me) all the way back, where luckily she met up with her sweetie.
The
next day we packed up, but our flight wasn’t till 7 pm. So we did a day drive out to Valley of Fire
and took in a couple of hikes. It was
beautiful, and all the times that Mike has driven past, he'd never been
there. We explored our first slot
canyon!
Now it is evident why Mike did not want TSA rifling through
his backpack on the outbound flight. They put it under the
X-ray machine and there, to anyone who knows what they’re looking for, was the
boxed ring that Michael had planned to present to me later that night. He had visions of TSA dumping the entire
contents of the backpack all over the evidence table there in the airport
terminal. No wonder he “invited” me to
wait “over there”!
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