Christmas at del Lago

(I shoulda photographed it myself at night.)

—“I found it,” I said to a youngish dude guarding the casino entrance at del Lago Casino and resort. “You must be 21 or older!” a big sign screamed.
Dreadlocks, very dark features, the sort of person that would terrify a honky into silence.
He looked like a refugee from Joseph Avenue’s projects, someone I waited for driving bus. I broke all the rules. If that kid was running after me, I stopped. I might be what kept him out of prison.
That casino-guard turned toward me.
“The way out,” I said.
He smiled. It always works. Take notice of him, he’ll appreciate it.
As a bus-driver I had plenty of terrifying honkies.
I was at del Lago with my Rochester niece. She’s my only Rochester relative. We would do del Lago’s buffet for Christmas dinner.
My niece came with her boyfriend, who is very interesting. My niece lives with her mother in her mother’s childhood home.
My niece’s boyfriend is after her husband, who she divorced (or he divorced her — I don’t know).
Del Lago is a gigantic new casino-resort, but it’s out in the middle of nowhere. The attraction is its casino.
It’s right next to NY state’s Thruway. In fact I hafta use the Thruway to get to it. It’s about an hour east of my house.
I always feel it’s too far. Finger Lakes Racino, an old horse-racing track that added a casino, is closer.
Every time I approach I wonder if del Lago can survive. There it stands. Six stories of glittering apparition. Parking galore = pave all surrounding pastures. It always seems like overkill, but the casino was extremely crowded. I don’t think the hotel and spa were.
“If all those people are waiting to get into the buffet, we sure hit the right time,” I said.
We were calmly eating our buffet servings.
“It’s the dinner rush,” my niece observed.
To do this I hafta leave my dog in the house. 3:45 p.m. to 8:30; almost five hours. One hour out, then an hour back.
Depressing to my mind, since my dog wants me around.
Flaccid Harley-mommas lazily caressed big trigger-buttons on the slots.
Geezers crossed the floor in slow-moving motorized carts.
It seemed the entire time I was there I was lost. Plus I’m not a casino person. All I was doing was asking directions of those who looked like del Lago employees.
The last time I was at del Lago, which was also my first time, was another buffet dinner with my niece.
That was two years ago. I never do the casino. My “gambling” (quote-unquote) is investing. And I let someone else do it for me.
Usually my niece’s mother comes along, but she was sick.
“Companionship,” my niece’s boyfriend said. I’m only just getting the hang of it, and 70 years late.
Why do I keep attending my YMCA aquatic-therapy class? Hang out with my lady-friends, of course. —They seem to like it.
This is all so contrary to how I was brought up. “NO PRETTY LADY WILL BEFRIEND YOU! All boy-girl relationships are evil and disgusting.”
And 10 years ago I probably woulda avoided that casino guard.

• For 16&1/2 years (1977-1993) I drove transit bus for Regional Transit Service (RTS) in Rochester, NY, a public employer, the transit-bus operator in Rochester and environs.
• “Joseph Avenue” is sorta Rochester’s slum area. It’s lined with crumbling low-rent subsidized-housing projects. Often my bus-driving was to take kids from those projects to a technical high-school on Rochester’s western outskirts.
• “No pretty lady will befriend you!” is the infamous Hilda Q. Walton, my neighbor Sunday-School Superintendent when I was a child. If my parents had come to my defense, Hilda woulda crashed in flames. But they heartily agreed.