Warning: This post does not contain beautiful coastal images and soulful poetry. Instead it is a random musing from time spent landlocked in Las Vegas during 117 degree heat.
In Vegas there is a bar called, Loser's Bar. It was between my hotel room and the convention center so I had the opportunity to pass by at least 4 times a day for 3 days.
It wasn't open at 6:00 am when I went to work, but by early afternoon every day there was "entertainment." A duo, on a rickety stage, drinking cheap beer while cigarettes smoked away in the ashtrays, singing the saddest country-western ballads ever written. They dug deep to find the most depressing songs and keep them coming one after another.
The first time I passed by, I thought it odd that any place in Las Vegas was named for losers, as the town's party line is all about winners and winning. Then, apparently, my fertile imagination took hold.
My next trip, I looked into the window and saw one lone soul at the bar. My ex was propped up on a stool, drowning his sorrows. He looked up from his drink and nodded as I passed by.
Later in the afternoon, a few more people had checked in to the Losers Bar. Each one of them was familiar to me and we had a negative encounter in the past. People who had done me wrong, just like in the songs. They acknowledged me through the window as well.
Each time I walked back and peered in the windows, a new patron appeared. Always someone I knew, always someone with whom I had a history, always acknowledging me with a raised shot glass or beer can. The phenomena lasted for three days. The bar was filling up.
It would have been laughable if it wasn't so very real. Okay, okay, it was pretty laughable. None to soon, my business trip ended and I quickly headed home. Luckily, "What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas."
This experience will be written off as a mirage in the desert during record-breaking heat and never mentioned again.
I now return you to our regular programming from the Oregon Coast.
