LJ Idol: Idol Mini 2024-Week 6: The Path

[reidharriscooper]

I walk a lonely road
The only one that I have ever known
Don't know where it goes
But it's home to me, and I walk alone - Green Day (2004)

The truth is, I do not walk alone. I have been very lucky on this path we call life to have people who have walked the paved and unpaved roads (literally and metaphorically) with me. Be it the dirty streets of the city, the abandoned rails of a train line, the dirt and rock mountains of a beach park, the alleys and hidden corners of a town, the bumpy floor of a convention center, or the deepest darkest deep mystery of the human psyche. Yet, I have also truly took my feet both covered and bare along many a destination with me, myself and I. That may sound like three people, but it is only one. Trust me, I'm only good at math when there's a dollar sign in front of it, but I can at least count to ten.

Lately my walking has not been alone. If and when I go outside during the last few months as I write this in August of 2024 I am pushing a wheelchair with a 135 pound woman in it and then sitting in long waits with my mind in patience. When I do walk alone, it isn't pretty or safe and it has gotten me in trouble. This is what that stress path is. You crawl before you walk, sometimes I wish I could go back to crawling. That isn't the way it is though, so to help one breath I look backwards at the footsteps made along the way and treasure every path and walk I have done.

One of the most interesting walking alone I ever did was in various days in Las Vegas. Actually walking from my hotel at the Excalibur all the way to Treasure Island then back again on the other side of the strip via Flamingo on my second day there in 2021 had affirming “life can be hard, but also awesome and rewarding”. It was not a direct route but calculating it all together would be around 7 miles walking, essentially alone. It was also a walk that was truly full of lessons and living in just one day. A day that began with discovering the joys of going down a slide and standing under a man-made water fall in the wee hours of the morning before actually proceeding with your day. If you have never gotten to feel perfectly tempered water crashing on your shoulders and back, especially the day after travel and lots of living you have not had that experience to your life and made it more bountiful.

   
This day continued with choosing to have my one and only meal of the day be the buffet at The Cosmopolitan Hotel known as The Wicked Spoon. My meal there was a lesson in gluttony. I ate so much I actually wrote it all down. This isn't about that meal, because I didn't walk, I sat, but boy did I journey, through countries and delicacies. That also lead to the purest of guiding paths to every bathroom I could make it to while still enjoying my day. Visiting bathrooms doesn't sound like something fun, but in Vegas it is an adventure. The theming of a hotel continues to their public bathrooms. It forced me to see the Bellagio gardens, the amazing sculptures of the Roman empire in Caesar's, the aquariums of fishes, the mermaids of The Mirage and so much more.

   

One of the most exhilarating experiences was having taken the walk to see something that now can only be seen via recordings and memories, having been torn down July 2024. The Mirage Volcano with its original music composition and spectacular choreographed fire and water show. Having this in front of ones own eyes lead to that continuing journey which only you can deliver yourself on even though the universe may conspire against you getting to every discovery you planned. You can't walk this same path I walked, at least not as I did. Spiritually, you can, the enlightenment, the pure joy of the existing world merged with the created. You can find it.

You can find it in many places. Some of them places I have been. Some I have never been. Some I will never get to go. Sometimes just in your mind, for the footsteps in our mind are the ones we truly are alone in and we can walk anywhere. Absolutely anywhere... a boulevard of broken dreams, a street of forbidden promises, a valley of endearing escapes, a hill of vaulted exuberance. It can all be reached, just take one step forward and walk; or roll, or crawl, whatever you feel most comfortable, it is your body and it is your mind!

[All photos by me from my trip.]

{written for LJ mini-Idol 2024: Week 6-“The path is made by walking”}

Comments

[roina_arwen]

Isn't Vegas just freaking AMAZING?? Let me tell you, we have stayed at the Excalibur before, as well as the Rio, Luxor, Circus Circus, one awesome night at the Venetian, what used to be the Star Trek Experience hotel (a Hilton) just off the strip, and probably others that I'm forgetting.

Folks - for those who have never gotten to Vegas, each hotel is about 10x bigger than your average hotel!

Walking the strip is being all alone but in a crowd, too. I'll have to remember The Wicked Spoon, I've never heard of it.

Thanks for the awesome photos and the memories.

[reidharriscooper]

I've only made the one and only trip and I did not make it to everything I planned. I never made it to the Wynn or the Westgate (the Hilton you mention, which on top being the Star Trek hotel was the Elvis hotel). or the Rio. I'd love to go for WM weekend, but also I'd rather go when it's NOT that crazy and wait for Universal's Halloween Horror Nights to open giving me a lot to explore. As well as the hotels on Fremont I never had time to go in. I wanna swim with them sharks.
Thanks so much for appreciating the post and photos.
I have almost 2000 from the trip including Arts District, Beer District and Area 15.

[erulissedances]

I've never been to Vegas, although I've wanted to go there. Still, your descriptions helped flesh the scene out and I'm already mourning the lack of the volcano.

- Erulisse (one L)

[reidharriscooper]

Thanks.
Yes, it's really sad the Volcano is actually gone. Plus that it's not being replaced by a show or anything but just a huge guitar. The Vegas we dream of is slowly going away and it's cryworthy.

[adoptedwriter]

I love Vegas. Gonna definitely miss the hey day era of the Mirage.

[reidharriscooper]

Legit... and then ya got places like Fountainbleu and Resortsworld...
if Mandalay, Luxor, Excalabir, Caesar's etc ever go by bye, Vegas will lose its attractiveness. No one wants to tourist in just hotels with casinos.

[muchtooarrogant]

"I'm only good at math when there's a dollar sign in front of it, but I can at least count to ten."

Isn't that the most important kind? :)

I loved the volcano at the Mirage. That was a great hotel.

Dan

[reidharriscooper]

I hear normal math is good for science...
like the science of programming water and fire at the Mirage.

I guess that math isn't worth the $.

[aggienaut]

Your posting of the song gives me an idea that might have been helpful at the beginning of this prompt-week ahaha -- everyone should have posted their favorite walking song. For me it would be Against Me! - Walking is Still Honest

[reidharriscooper]

Boulevard of Broken Dreams would definitely not be my Walking song.

A good day walking song for me would be "The The - This Is The Day"

[fausts_dream]

I stayed at the Flamingo once, your walk sounds much more rewarding than I found their Blackjack tables. Cool entry.

[reidharriscooper]

Thanks.
I avoided gambling completely. Not even a one armed bandit. Food, sights, entertainment, that's what I want. Also graffiti and culture, which I also got.

The Flamingo was nice. I stopped there at night and during the day but just to see Flamingos. I don't know how the hotel itself is.

[mollywheezy]

I've never been to Vegas, so thank you for taking me on your journey in my mind. :) Great pictures!

[reidharriscooper]

Thanks.
You know you can also go in your mind. I went many a time in my mind before I went and now still because I can't time travel to things that are now gone or to things still under construction
Try going in your mind!

[rayaso]

I haven't been to Las Vegas, but I enjoyed your description of it - especially the meal. The photos added a lot.

[reidharriscooper]

Thank you.
The meal was ... a lot... like a lot. Going in and going out, but it was delicious and never one going out was it actually unpleasant amazingly. Although I'd still hold back if I ever went to a buffet again.

[halfshellvenus]

The dessert half of your buffet looks amazing!

I sounds like you made a solid, worthy adventure out of Vegas in a way most people don't even think about doing. I've never liked Vegas, but your adventure there sounded like fun!

[reidharriscooper]

The bread pudding and the fresh fruit was the best of it as I recall.

I'd be curious what kind of vacation you like because Vegas is set in a way that you could get it all. A nature trip, a museum trip, a water park, even amusement.

[halfshellvenus]

I, uh, grew up in the Pacific Northwest. I still think of Portland as my home.

So, when you think rainforest, the desert (especially the Nevada desert) is more depressing than appealing. And the hippy-dippy background tends to make the garish fakeitude of Las Vegas just seem kind of awful. I'm glad not everyone else feels that way, though! Never been to a water park there, but I've been on a business trip where we stayed at the Flamingo, and I really liked its pools. I've only been to Vegas once in the last 27 years, so I'm sure a lot has changed!

[reidharriscooper]

Oh if you like the WEIRD of Portland, Vegas has it tons.

Wrestling in the middle of a artisans market, various alleys dedicated to revolving new graffiti and street art. An entire craft beer district with various breweries as well as distilleries. Then you have Area 15 which is full of Immersive art.

[murielle]

My favourite part is the end because it's completely do-able.

I always enjoy going adventuring with you, seeing and experiencing parts of the world I will never see anywhere else. Thank you so much for this your of a street in Law Vegas.

Marvellous! 👏👏👏

[reidharriscooper]

Thank you many much.
I am so glad someone noticed the begininning and ending of this were more important than the middle Vegas stuff. Even if you also enjoyed the Vegas stuff.
(I could easily done anything in the middle hereof a solo walk with lots of adventure, downtown Orlando, a Brooklyn tour, San Diego, Dallas... okay, those were the solo options... but still)

[bleodswean]

For some reason I can't see the photos, but your descriptions are clear enough for me to imagine them! What a wonderful response to the prompt! I love the way you take this single memorable walk and extrapolate all of this!

[reidharriscooper]

Thank you very much on the writing praise
and on the heads up on the photo links breaking.
They were linked off of Facebook and somehow all the links changed so I had to relink.

[static_abyss]

Those photos are amazing. I've been to Vegas many times to visit family but I've never spent much time in the casinos or hotels. I think maybe next time I'll stop to take a look.

[reidharriscooper]

Thank you.
Yes, do so. I wish I could go to Vegas more often. There's so much to see and experience at every hotel that I feel a visit every weekend if I could would never see everything they offer.