You probably don’t remember the first time you went to Disneyland. By the time you were entrenched in childhood, that trademarked castle was branded on your brain. Enter the park and be surrounded by color, light and sound unlike anything at home or in school. McDonald’s was much the same, only with less travel time. Inside those Golden Arches™ were light and sound and comfort.
As an adult, I avoid both McDonald’s and Disneyland. When I was short they were magic, as was Las Vegas.
My grandfather was a ‘macher’ in Las Vegas when I was a child. (Find a Jewish friend to translate, if I had another word I would have used it.) He favored the Hacienda. Appropriately enough, my own casino is in Mandalay Bay in the same location. You’d think the magic would have staled from when I was tiny, wandering among the slots, staring up in happy amazement. Only the angle changed. Now I sit happily, as happily as once I rode the Matterhorn, with about the same number of ups and downs.
Las Vegas is in constant flux but with a consistent level of banality that I find comforting. Because we’re there seasonally, the subtle changes are more apparent and more significant. What’s odd is that I went from feeling like an outsider observing the stream of humanity, to feeling like an insider doing the same. We know the people, and they know us. More important, they feed us.
I never thought I’d say this, but I’ll take a piece of perfectly seared escolar over a Big Mac any day. The times, they have a-changed.
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