KAREN LENFESTEY, "Happy Endings with a Twist"
  • Home
  • Reviews
  • Biography
  • Book Clubs
  • Contact Karen
  • Author Interview
  • Author Events
  • Treats for Mom blog

Warming Up to Las Vegas

3/7/2014

0 Comments

 
Picture
Of all the cities in the U.S., Las Vegas was the last one I ever wanted to visit. Maybe it’s because growing up, I lost every bet to an older, wiser brother. Maybe it’s because I’m past the age when I want to do something wild on the weekends. Maybe it’s because I didn’t believe people when they told me there’s plenty to do in Vegas besides gamble. Whatever the reason, a business trip forced me to visit Sin City during the harshest winter of my life and I’m glad it did.

Even before the slot machines greeted me at the Vegas airport, I’d decided to never leave my hotel. That’s one of the great things about Vegas hotels—they have everything you need at your disposal: restaurants, salons, nightly shows and even a magic shop where I picked up a great box of tricks for my 8-year-old daughter.

             After watching CSI re-runs with the new perspective of “Hey, I’ve been there,” my gaze landed on the Las Vegas magazine on my bureau. On the cover stood a woman in an elegant black gown with matching silk gloves and a caption that made my heart skip a beat: Titanic. The traveling exhibit had caught my attention months earlier, but I hadn’t been able to see it. Within minutes, I stepped out into the sunshine, hailed a taxi and headed for the Luxor. The exhibit eerily re-created the luxury ship so well, I vacillated between longing for such opulence and shuddering at the tragic end to so many lives. My boarding pass held the name of a real passenger, Thomas Drake Martinez Cardeza, a man returning from an African safari whose suite featured two bedrooms, a sitting room and a private fifty-foot promenade. At first, I thought, “Well, I’ll survive since I’m first class.”

I walked along a frigid wooden deck in a dark room to find individual stories interspersed between porcelain dishes, alligator pocketbooks, and spectacles recovered from the ocean floor. I read about a man’s possessions that went down with the ship, whose life was only spared because he’d been shanghaied before the Titanic disembarked. How lucky, I thought ironically. I read about a family that could’ve afforded first class cabins, but to save money, chose to stay in second class. I hope that decision didn’t cost them their lives, I thought. I read about a woman who felt her life was ruined because she lost her husband when the ship sank. I’d forgotten about the captain’s cry for “women and children first.” Maybe Thomas Drake Martinez Cardeza didn’t survive, after all. I shivered.

            I definitely studied the list of those who died closely before I exited the exhibit.

            After surviving one of the greatest shipwrecks of all time, I became bold enough to explore more of the city. I took in the impressive trapeze act at Circus, Circus and the Bellagio fountains, which danced to classical music. I walked along the strip, enjoying the spectacle of colored lights, pillars and roller coasters, which I’d only ever seen in pictures. An hour whizzed by and I was happy I’d dared to leave my hotel.          

            What surprised me the most about Vegas was how friendly the people were. Maria, the housekeeper at the Riviera, gave me a full-sized container of conditioner from her own locker because I’d forgotten mine at home (and wouldn’t let me pay her for it). An Ethiopian taxi driver insisted I take his bottled water when my sinus infection caused me to break into a coughing fit. The cashier at the 7-11, who sold me a postage stamp, made me laugh when he told me his tech-savvy little brother asked him how to address an envelope. Then the boy said, “Never mind. I’ll just Google it.”

            So, thank you, Nevada’s City of Lights, for showing me there’s more to you than meets the eye. A few days later, when I returned to the piles of snow and freezing temperatures of Indiana, I missed the warmth of Vegas—in more ways than one.

Visit www.lasvegas.com to learn more about things to do on your Vegas vacation and visit www.RMSTitanic.net to see where you can experience history for yourself.

If you need a good book to read on the flight, check out www.karensnovels.com for “Happy Endings with a Twist.” Karen Lenfestey’s novel, A Sister’s Promise, has been called “intriguing, sometimes humorous, and heart-warming” and has sold over 40,000 copies at Amazon.



0 Comments

    RSS Feed

    Contact Karen
    Picture
    Should Bethany track down the daughter she's never known just to give her bad news?
    Picture
    What event could make a woman second-guess her stance on motherhood?
    join karen's club

    Archives

    January 2024
    May 2019
    April 2016
    May 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    March 2014
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    July 2012
    May 2012
    March 2012
    February 2012
    January 2012
    December 2011
    November 2011
    October 2011
    September 2011

    Categories

    All
    Advice
    Angelina Jolie
    Antenna
    Apo
    Appreciation
    Babies
    Band-aids
    Blog Hop
    Book Review
    Books
    Bribe
    Butterflies
    Cable
    Career
    Cat
    Charity
    Chick Lit
    Childhood
    Children
    Christmas
    Civil Rights
    Clue
    Cookies
    Cooking
    Crushes
    Crying
    Cutting The Cord
    Dads
    Date
    Daughter
    Daughters
    Diet
    Donut
    Duma
    Dvd
    Easy Recipes
    Ethics
    Fairies
    Family
    Family Film
    Fatherhood
    February
    Fiction
    First Love
    Free Book
    Fun
    Gambling
    Games
    Girls
    Grandchildren
    Grandmothers
    Gratitude
    Grumpy Cat
    Hero
    History
    Humor
    Ice Cream
    Interview
    Job
    Karate
    Kid Recipes
    Kids
    Kids Movies
    Kitten
    Kittens
    Las Vegas
    Las Vegas Strip
    Leadership
    Left-handed
    Losing
    Love
    Love-hate
    Magic
    Marriage
    Martin Luther King Jr.
    Midwest Writer's Workshop
    Mixed Messages
    Mom
    Moms
    Monday
    Morals
    Motherhood
    Movies
    Murphy's Law
    Niagara Falls
    No
    Novella
    Novels
    Nutrition
    Oprah
    Oreos
    Parenthood
    Parenting
    Pets
    Philanthropy
    Reading
    Recipes
    Reward
    Riviera Hotel
    Role Model
    Romance
    SAHM
    Sal Dimiceli
    Santa
    Smoothie
    Snacks
    Sportsmanship
    Stay At Home Moms
    Stay-at-home Moms
    Student
    Summer
    Tae Kwon Do
    Teacher
    Teachers
    Tears
    Television
    Thankful
    Thanksgiving
    The Next Big Thing
    Titanic
    Tourism
    Tradition
    Treat
    Trips
    TV
    Vacation
    Vacations
    Valentine
    Valentines
    Vegas
    Vote
    Winning
    Women's Fiction
    Working Moms
    Writing

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.