Las Vegas is a canvas for the deranged. The out of touch, the ones who power through, all in one place and all trying to outdo one another. It’s all good vibes and bad intentions. The desert is stained with sin. The highs are perpetually high and the lows plummet through the earth only after it’s wheels up.
I found myself in Las Vegas for a bachelor and a trip ten years in the making. A weekend full of stars for the Grammy’s and we walked around like we were bigger than all of them. A years worth of payments earned us the best tables, the biggest parties, and way too much money to spend.
We went from beggars to royalty overnight. We spent 26k in one day on liquor alone. Us, the same group of guys who venmo request each other to cover the $100 tab at the local American Legion. But in Vegas, that group of guys who used to charge each other $1 for loosie cigarettes didn’t exist. We were throwing around money both literally and figuratively. And it did not go unnoticed.
Back home, we’ve been hanging out with the same group of girls since the sixth grade. One of those girls has dated three of us. We do alright collectively as a group. Some more than others. But when you have the best views of DaBaby, Alesso, David Guetta, Tiesto, Nelly, and you’re paying two grand a round, we all start looking like McConaughey. Women were lining up and dancing on top of each other in hopes that the twinkle in their eye caught one our attention to allow them entry. We were playing live-action Tinder and using our personal bouncer to swipe left and right. One female in particular put on the best pole show I’ve ever seen while using our pool party umbrella. Nothing was left to the imagination. She had to have been a stripper, so us being gentleman, paid her like one.
We were dressed to kill. We walked like the casinos owed us something. We had balls as big as the Paris balloon. We tripped through a portal where we were the kings of everything we saw.
And now? Back to no one. Back to work. Back to New Jersey? How? Two days ago I was playing God and now I’m eating dinner in my room watching Survivor. I spent too much time in the fantasy that now reality seems fake. Everything is upside down.
Nothing could trouble me in Las Vegas. Oh we got stuck in an elevator for forty minutes with sixteen people? Don’t care. My flight’s cancelled and I have to stay another day? Don’t care. UNC blew the largest lead ever and I can’t cash the slip that would’ve paid for my whole trip? Don’t care, I’m in Vegas. But today I made a plate of tacos and when I realized I didn’t have sour cream, I was a split second away from launching the entire plate at the kitchen wall.
But I wouldn’t change a thing. I made stories for life and secrets for the grave. Hunter Thompson in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas said, “Buy the ticket, take the ride…tune in, freak out, get beaten.” I agree, buy the ticket. The only thing you’ll regret is coming home.
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