We’re heading west towards Las Vegas on an old fashioned road trip.  My firstborn, Kate Louise, is going to the chapel to get married on March ‘21’.  She and Glen share a playful sense of humor.  They thought it’d be fun to tie the knot in Vegas.  

They’d originally planned do have Elvis do the honors, but now its grown up into a more dignified affair.  Myself, I relished meeting Elvis.  But what adult child seeks the advice of their mother, may I ask?

When I was a little girl of seven, I was going to marry Elvis Presley when I grew up.  Elvis was literally the first man of my dreams.  And with childlike faith, I knew he was going to wait for me.  I fell in love over a Coca Cola and some Milk Duds at the Ritz Movie Theatre.  Naturally, I saw all of Elvis’s movies, some more than twice, but my two favorites were “Fun in Acapulco” and “Viva Las Vegas.” 

Viva Las Vegas — long live Las Vegas–even without the real Elvis, who’s been dead ever since I grew up.  But there’s still a chance I might glimpse a close facsimile or two.  I hear they’re plentiful in Vegas.  And to think…had Kate and Glen kept with the original plan, their official wedding photo with the fam would have included Elvis in the middle.  How close can one come to making a little girl’s long ago dream come true?  Me and Elvis in a Vegas wedding chapel!

It takes a lot of work to giddy up and go on vacation.  And all the getting up before you go stuff takes the same amount of effort whether you’re gone for 2 days or 2 weeks.  I never understood this rigmarole as a child.  There’s the packing and farming out of loved ones – like poodles and tomato seedlings.  There are newspapers to stop and security services to notify:  “Ladies and Gentlemen…. Elvis has left the building”.  Then we had to pack our own stuff, including those last minute purchases, like my wedding day attire I finally bought yesterday.  

Then, there’s the everyday stuff of life begging to be done all at once, as if you’re never coming home again. So this week I paid bills, cleaned the house, planted my cool season vegetables, fertilized and trimmed our shrubs, over-seeded my neighbor’s fescue lawn and dusted the upstairs blinds.  Twenty down–none to go. 

And then there’s the visual clues you leave behind on the kitchen counter in case you really don’t come back, like the newspaper article that shows where the poodles are being boarded.  I showed some restraint in not pulling our wills out of the file cabinets.  

There is an excitement in the air when you travel to faraway places. Our first stop– a town out in western New Mexico–a place called Gallup.  Giddy up.  Let’s go.