I apologize for the delay in getting this post up; the past few days have been completely non-stop and tonight’s (Sunday the 26th) overnight at JFK is affording me the perfect opportunity to get caught up!
I spent most of Wednesday walking around the Las Vegas strip after arriving late on Tuesday night. I’m not sure what else once can say about Las Vegas other than the fact Vegas is Vegas and I don’t think it’ll ever change.
That being said, it was my 9th trip to Vegas and I’ve NEVER seen things as empty, quiet, slow, etc… The fall of the economy has hit Vegas pretty hard. No, I’m not saying that I feel sorry for the people who spent $10,000 a night on a hotel room or who bought an insanely overpriced condo at the height of the boom. I do, however, feel sorry for the pit boss who’d worked in Vegas for years and is now driving a cab. Or the musician who played in a lounge for years and now plays on the sidewalk. Yes, I gave him a few bucks. He was THAT good. The kind of good where I wish I knew someone in the music business that could help the guy and his family.
You see all kinds in Vegas and my quick trip was no exception. The typical tourists snapping pictures, the ‘high-rollers’ spending WAY too much money on the tables, the ‘alternative’ people who dress in clothes that I didn’t know existed, etc… And guess what they all have in common? Knowing someone who’s been affected by cancer.
While on my flight from Long Beach to Las Vegas I was seated next to 2 ladies, Ruth and Jackie. Neither of these ladies had ever met prior to our flight. Ruth is a fellow ‘All You Can Jet Jetter’ with me (and approx. 4,998 other people, or so rumor has it since JetBlue won’t confirm how many passes they sold). She hadn’t been to Vegas since the 1980s and was looking forward to going back for 2 nights. Jackie had no idea what AYCJ was, which is how the whole conversation started. We then got to discussing what I was doing traveling, etc… and the conversation took off in an entirely different direction.
Jackie and Ruth both lost their husbands to brain cancer. Odder than that was the fact that for both men their brain cancer started as lung cancer. There was a clear ‘ah ha’ moment for Ruth and Jackie, as we had already talked about their love of travel. Both of them take every opportunity that they have to travel, to meet new people, to experience new things, etc… While I know that either 1 of them would much rather be traveling with their husbands they aren’t wasting the opportunities that they have now.
Our conversation echoed many that I’ve had in the past few weeks; seize the day because you don’t know what tomorrow holds. It was nice to see that even on the way to ‘Sin City’ there was good to be found!