In Florida, I learned about Ponce de Leon, and the Fountain of Youth, and St. Augustine in my history classes. But there I was in South Florida, and there was St. Augustine in Northeast Florida. I could read about it, but I couldn't readily see it. We went there sometimes during my childhood, but the last time I could remember going was when I was reaching my late teens, when my paternal grandparents were with us on that trip, and even then it was relatively brief, although I do remember seeing the fort. But if I wanted to know more about it beyond those visits, there were the books. We didn't always have reason to go back and if it was a choice between that or Walt Disney World today, I would choose Walt Disney World first and then see if there was time later to travel on up to St. Augustine.
The biggest disappointment of moving from South Florida to Southern California, before nine years' existence in Southern California became the biggest disappointment, was that I only got to see Tallahassee, my state capital, once, and that was when we were driving out of Florida. That's where the legislature meets and that's where the governor's mansion is. I don't think I saw the governor's mansion on the way out, but I saw the Capitol. And that's all I saw of my seat of state government. In years to come, I want to go back to visit, to see how my old haunts have changed, and I'd like to see Tallahassee again, to spend more time, to have a closer look at what remained far away as we drove by.
It's because of that missed opportunity that I hold more dearly to me the pleasure of having history nearby in Las Vegas, some in Henderson, and in Boulder City. Mostly Boulder City, since it's my favorite place in Southern Nevada. I have here a book called Hoover Dam & Boulder City by Marion V. Allen, whose family lived in Boulder City, and who also worked on the construction of Hoover Dam (Boulder Dam back then). I always love receiving books from the Boulder City library because it's my favorite in the entire Las Vegas-Clark County Library District, although it operates differently in many ways from the rest of the libraries in that cluster, with a separate website for one, and you're given two extra days with any books you receive from that branch because of the distance. Boulder City is close enough to Las Vegas, closer to Henderson, but when you drive there, it feels like a different world, higher up in the mountains. Unlike the trapped feeling I always got in Santa Clarita, there's so much more to see here, so much more to wonder about.
Besides reading Hoover Dam & Boulder City out of my fervent desire to know more about the history of all that's around me, I'm looking for more information about Boulder City manager Sims Ely, who ran the town single-handedly during the construction of Hoover Dam. He was hired by the government to do so, to be sure that their investment did not go to waste, and I think there's more history of him to be found, more stories that should be told. To some, he was a despot, but that may be only because he didn't allow gambling or alcohol inside Boulder City. He strikes me as having been fair-minded, but there's not as much to be found about him as there should be. I hope to rectify that in time.
But more than any of that, I love reading about living conditions in Boulder City and Hoover Dam construction and know that I have been to both. I read these details and I know exactly what's being referenced, where it is, and what it looks like today. I'm not good yet with directions in Boulder City, which streets intersect and the easiest way to get to the Boulder City library, but I'll get there. I have lots of time for that. To be able to go to those scenes of history, to be there and remember what I have read and picture it right there is new to me. As mentioned, I didn't have the chance all that often in Florida, and there was very little history of Southern California that I cared to know, outside of Buena Park and Anaheim, and even then, I didn't get as deep into Buena Park, where other history might have been. So this is pretty much all new to me, always fascinating, and I don't think it will ever waver. Nor will the sheer novelty of the California-Nevada border being merely 35 minutes away, albeit with long stretches of road empty on both sides. Both my parents came from New York and therefore it was nothing to them to go into New Jersey or Connecticut and back again. The biggest thing for me in Florida in terms of travel like that was that it took only an hour to get from the east side of the state to the west side, from Pembroke Pines, where we lived many years before we moved, to Naples. Only an hour! And yet, there were no states to cross until you get to Northern Florida, and then out. The only time I had ever crossed borders was from the air, when we flew on Delta from Ft. Lauderdale to Newark in 1994, and all I noticed were mountains we flew over. I didn't even think of borders.
Now, when we're in Primm, especially at the lotto store to the left of the Fashion Outlets of Las Vegas, I can look right out at the roads and see the border and the signs right there, one welcoming drivers to California on the right, and the other welcoming drivers to Nevada on the left. That I can see that, and I can see where history happened wherever I want, and see what it is today and if aspects of that history have been preserved (beyond Hoover Dam, of course, and the Boulder City/Hoover Dam Museum all the way in the back on the second floor of the Boulder Dam Hotel), at times means more to me than seeing the Strip just as often. I love knowing that others have been here before me and I always want to know what brought them there and how they reacted when they first saw it, and what they wanted to do when they got here, what they were looking for. Just another way of knowing that I really am home.
Showing posts with label boulder city. Show all posts
Showing posts with label boulder city. Show all posts
Saturday, May 18, 2013
Monday, February 18, 2013
The Generosity at Hoover Dam
On the same page in Boulder City: Passages of Time that made up the previous entry, I also found this, which deserved its own entry:
"One of the unique features is the cafeteria-style lunch-basket room. The men file through, take an empty box, and fill it with whatever they wish. Sandwiches, pieces of pie, etc., are all wrapped in waxine bags. If a man wants only six pieces of pie, he can have them. By this method all are satisfied and there is none of the proverbial grumbling about the grub in the lunch boxes." -- New Reclamation Era, November, 1931.
Under that paragraph is this, which shows that generosity is possible anywhere, even during the hard work of building Hoover Dam:
"...We work it this way. I bring the sandwiches, another fella brings the fruit, another the cake. If we have anything left we give it to the guys who don't have anything to eat." -- Buck Blaine, Nevadan Magazine, Las Vegas Review Journal, 8/26/73.
"One of the unique features is the cafeteria-style lunch-basket room. The men file through, take an empty box, and fill it with whatever they wish. Sandwiches, pieces of pie, etc., are all wrapped in waxine bags. If a man wants only six pieces of pie, he can have them. By this method all are satisfied and there is none of the proverbial grumbling about the grub in the lunch boxes." -- New Reclamation Era, November, 1931.
Under that paragraph is this, which shows that generosity is possible anywhere, even during the hard work of building Hoover Dam:
"...We work it this way. I bring the sandwiches, another fella brings the fruit, another the cake. If we have anything left we give it to the guys who don't have anything to eat." -- Buck Blaine, Nevadan Magazine, Las Vegas Review Journal, 8/26/73.
They Began Badly, Too
Yesterday, I wrote about how I ate badly during our first few days as residents in Las Vegas, and that it eventually took its toll on me. Only after our mattresses were delivered, and when we began shopping for groceries, did I improve and turned my attention to becoming acclimated to Las Vegas as a resident, away from my days as a tourist.
In state history, I'm not the only one who did this. I put a book on hold from the Boulder City Library, commissioned by the Boulder City Library in 1981, called Boulder City: Passages in Time by Angela Brooker and Dennis McBride, the latter Boulder City's most famous historian. I checked this out of the Whitney Library last Saturday.
There's no page numbers in this book, but I found this at the beginning of the chapter about construction of Hoover Dam:
"It is a fact that there were a great many heat deaths in the canyon during the first summer down there. That was for two reasons. One was because of the heat, and the second was that the people working in the canyons had been on one or less meals per day for quite some time. And when they got down there and saw the Anderson Commissary there, with all this food stacked up to eat, they just couldn't believe it. They just gorged themselves and then went down in the canyon, and the heat'd hit 'em, and they'd keel over. The government, at that time, when all the deaths were occurring, asked Harvard University to send out some scientists to see what could be done to combat the heat. And they came up with the salt tablets to prevent dehydration. And every employee at the dam working in the canyon and those that weren't too, I guess, were required to have salt tablets in their possession at all times, and to take about one an hour. And it was determined that this did a great deal towards combating the heat prostration, although, once the people got used to eating regularly and not quite as much as they did when they first came there, it was all right." -- John F. Cahlan, Reminiscences of a Reno and Las Vegas, Nevada newspaperman, University Regent, and public-spirited citizen: typed transcript of a tape-recorded interview conducted by Mary Ellen Glass, Oral History Project, Getchell Library, University of Nevada, Reno, April 1968.
That's exactly what it was, with the food, but without the heat. I had gorged myself when I was a tourist and did it again without care in our first few days here, just for energy, while rapidly becoming exhausted at the same time. I can relate to those workers, and thankfully, just like they were, I'm settled here, and much more mindful.
In state history, I'm not the only one who did this. I put a book on hold from the Boulder City Library, commissioned by the Boulder City Library in 1981, called Boulder City: Passages in Time by Angela Brooker and Dennis McBride, the latter Boulder City's most famous historian. I checked this out of the Whitney Library last Saturday.
There's no page numbers in this book, but I found this at the beginning of the chapter about construction of Hoover Dam:
"It is a fact that there were a great many heat deaths in the canyon during the first summer down there. That was for two reasons. One was because of the heat, and the second was that the people working in the canyons had been on one or less meals per day for quite some time. And when they got down there and saw the Anderson Commissary there, with all this food stacked up to eat, they just couldn't believe it. They just gorged themselves and then went down in the canyon, and the heat'd hit 'em, and they'd keel over. The government, at that time, when all the deaths were occurring, asked Harvard University to send out some scientists to see what could be done to combat the heat. And they came up with the salt tablets to prevent dehydration. And every employee at the dam working in the canyon and those that weren't too, I guess, were required to have salt tablets in their possession at all times, and to take about one an hour. And it was determined that this did a great deal towards combating the heat prostration, although, once the people got used to eating regularly and not quite as much as they did when they first came there, it was all right." -- John F. Cahlan, Reminiscences of a Reno and Las Vegas, Nevada newspaperman, University Regent, and public-spirited citizen: typed transcript of a tape-recorded interview conducted by Mary Ellen Glass, Oral History Project, Getchell Library, University of Nevada, Reno, April 1968.
That's exactly what it was, with the food, but without the heat. I had gorged myself when I was a tourist and did it again without care in our first few days here, just for energy, while rapidly becoming exhausted at the same time. I can relate to those workers, and thankfully, just like they were, I'm settled here, and much more mindful.
Saturday, February 16, 2013
The Right Time
Last Saturday, at the end of a few hours in my fantasy home of Boulder City that included Goatfeathers Too (annex to the main, sprawling antique store across the street), Goatfeathers (the main store), lunch at Mel's Diner (a middle-of-my-best-list patty melt with onions and swiss cheese), lots of chocolate covered things ordered at Grandma Daisy's, and finding out that TuTu's Books was closed for maintenance until Tuesday, we stopped at the Boulder City Library, my temple, my sanctuary, possibly above all other libraries in this valley. I don't think other libraries to see in Henderson could possibly compare to this one, even though I'm fond of the tall bookcases at the James I. Gibson Library.
With no room on my library card, I used Meridith's for three books I wanted: Finding Casey by Jo-Ann Mapson, which I saw was set in New Mexico and wanted it right away; Father O'Brien and His Girls by David Chandler, set in Las Vegas, and which I found in the Nevada Room (I want to read all the books in there); and Dog Days at the White House: The Outrageous Memoirs of the Presidential Kennel Keeper by Traphes Bryant with Frances Spatz Leighton. Bryant was the White House electrician who was there from Truman through Nixon, but took up taking care of the First Dogs from Kennedy through Nixon.
Meridith checked out those three for me along with a few books to read to Tigger and Kitty, and then I spotted The Care and Handling of Roses with Thorns by Margaret Dilloway, a novel about a regimented 36-year-old biology teacher who severe kidney ailments who's a rose breeder. I'm interested in flowers, but those other details seized my attention, because I am as regimented as her in my reading. Nothing can get between her and her roses (though that will likely change), and nothing can get between me and my books.
I decided that since three books from the Boulder City Library seemed like enough since I had all those other library books at home, and more books on hold to pick up the next day, I would put this one on hold and pick it up at the Whitney Library, my usual branch, the Sunday after the following one. I did, but after we got home from that day, which afterward included exploring the M Resort in Henderson, I wished that I had given that book to Meridith to check out as well. I badly wanted to read it, and that copy belonging to Boulder City, that should have been enough incentive for me since I prefer Boulder City copies of any books whenever possible.
But, as has been my experience in the past, there are times for certain books, and they may not be right away.
Take today. I picked up The Care and Handling of Roses with Thorns at the Whitney Library, along with my other holds. I was finishing Finding Casey and determined that that would be the next book I started, since I had waited a week and couldn't stop thinking about it during that week.
It has been such a nice day today. Recently, I finally became accustomed to the slow rhythm of the desert, which merits its own post soon. I have learned to breathe slowly and really smell the desert around me, and I feel good. Finding Casey was a gentle, understated wave of a novel that made me more curious about the plants of New Mexico and its customs, and what better atmosphere in which to start The Care and Handling of Roses with Thorns?
I am where I want to be, living a life that will soon be fully formed with the arrival of the job I want, and finished a novel that held such promise and delivered on it. And the middle of the afternoon was just as gentle as that novel, as the desert, unseasonably warm, but a welcome break from sweatshirts, which I don't like, having been born and raised and spectacularly spoiled in Florida. I'm now on chapter 4 of The Care and Handling of Roses with Thorns, on page 40. So far, it has been worth the wait.
With no room on my library card, I used Meridith's for three books I wanted: Finding Casey by Jo-Ann Mapson, which I saw was set in New Mexico and wanted it right away; Father O'Brien and His Girls by David Chandler, set in Las Vegas, and which I found in the Nevada Room (I want to read all the books in there); and Dog Days at the White House: The Outrageous Memoirs of the Presidential Kennel Keeper by Traphes Bryant with Frances Spatz Leighton. Bryant was the White House electrician who was there from Truman through Nixon, but took up taking care of the First Dogs from Kennedy through Nixon.
Meridith checked out those three for me along with a few books to read to Tigger and Kitty, and then I spotted The Care and Handling of Roses with Thorns by Margaret Dilloway, a novel about a regimented 36-year-old biology teacher who severe kidney ailments who's a rose breeder. I'm interested in flowers, but those other details seized my attention, because I am as regimented as her in my reading. Nothing can get between her and her roses (though that will likely change), and nothing can get between me and my books.
I decided that since three books from the Boulder City Library seemed like enough since I had all those other library books at home, and more books on hold to pick up the next day, I would put this one on hold and pick it up at the Whitney Library, my usual branch, the Sunday after the following one. I did, but after we got home from that day, which afterward included exploring the M Resort in Henderson, I wished that I had given that book to Meridith to check out as well. I badly wanted to read it, and that copy belonging to Boulder City, that should have been enough incentive for me since I prefer Boulder City copies of any books whenever possible.
But, as has been my experience in the past, there are times for certain books, and they may not be right away.
Take today. I picked up The Care and Handling of Roses with Thorns at the Whitney Library, along with my other holds. I was finishing Finding Casey and determined that that would be the next book I started, since I had waited a week and couldn't stop thinking about it during that week.
It has been such a nice day today. Recently, I finally became accustomed to the slow rhythm of the desert, which merits its own post soon. I have learned to breathe slowly and really smell the desert around me, and I feel good. Finding Casey was a gentle, understated wave of a novel that made me more curious about the plants of New Mexico and its customs, and what better atmosphere in which to start The Care and Handling of Roses with Thorns?
I am where I want to be, living a life that will soon be fully formed with the arrival of the job I want, and finished a novel that held such promise and delivered on it. And the middle of the afternoon was just as gentle as that novel, as the desert, unseasonably warm, but a welcome break from sweatshirts, which I don't like, having been born and raised and spectacularly spoiled in Florida. I'm now on chapter 4 of The Care and Handling of Roses with Thorns, on page 40. So far, it has been worth the wait.
Tuesday, February 5, 2013
The Ghosts of Boulder City
Last Saturday, a friend of mine, a resident of Boulder City, my favorite city in all of Southern Nevada, showed me around. We went to TuTu's Books, which you have to climb stairs to get to, and I learned from Mom later that the block that TuTu's is on is actually houses that were divided for businesses to move in.
I want to move into TuTu's. The next day, I thought about where the biography section was, overlooking another block of stores, where I saw a man and a woman walking a dog below, and I wanted to replace the biography section with a bed for myself. I wouldn't need as big a TV as I have now. Just one to bring in Jeopardy!, The Big Bang Theory, and How It's Made, along with a DVD player for my movies. But being that I would have not only the books in TuTu's, but also my own collection, plus being within walking distance of the Boulder City Library, I don't think I'd watch TV all that often. Not that I do now anyway. For example, I Tivo'd Monday Mornings on TNT last night, which I want to see because it's based on a novel by Sanjay Gupta that I really like. I still haven't gotten to it.
We went to Goatfeathers, which is the largest antique store I've ever seen, with two upstairs areas, one of them for dishes and mugs and other kitchen supplies. And we went to another antique store where they've got a good handle on furniture, armoires and sturdy squat bookcases that I'd be hard-pressed to find in such good condition at the average furniture store. Later, we went to the Boulder Dam Brewing Co. for dinner, where I had an excellent blue cheese burger and the fries were pretty good, too.
But all that paled in importance, though refocused itself later, in comparison to the parking lot behind the Bureau of Reclamation building, where I was led to see the view of Lake Mead from there. I saw houses stretching to the lake, mountains cradling the lake, and I found the meaning of life. I felt such inner peace that I don't think I've ever felt before, not like this, not as pronounced. The other time I did, though it was far less than this, was every Friday in Pembroke Pines, in our development at Grand Palms, when I came home from school, and the sunlight through the trees, golden on the sidewalks, made it feel like the universe was aligned.
Then came the biggest discovery of all: Finding peace on Earth. We had bumped into my friend's former co-worker at that Bureau of Reclamation building, and she took us up to her office to see the view of Lake Mead from her window, which was also spectacular, but I always need the air around me in order to appreciate that view. I chatted with her for a few minutes, and then it was time to go, since she had work to do, even though it was a Saturday. But she had the right idea since there was no noise in the building, it was totally quiet, and certainly you could get a lot done that way. I told her that when I was in middle school and my teachers made us get in groups, I hated it because I always knew I could get the work done faster on my own. Ironic that those teachers were promoting socialization, yet would always tell us to be quiet and get to work.
We walked downstairs, back to the entrance/exit of the building, pushed the door open to the outside, went out, and went down the short stairs that rise to, and fall from, the building. In front of us was the half-bowl shaped park for dog walkers, joggers, and people like us, just strolling and looking around.
We started down the lip of the half-bowl, down that hill, and even though I couldn't see the sunset happening at that moment, I could feel it. The streetlights had come on, no sickly orangish glow here. Pure, gentle white lights. I looked at those lights in the park, and across the street at other buildings, and I felt peace on Earth. As my friend's former co-worker reminded me when I exclaimed my love of Boulder City, it is a unique situation. And she's right. Boulder City was created by the government to house the workers building Hoover (then Boulder) Dam, because they didn't want them living in Las Vegas, getting caught up in that debauched (their perception) lifestyle, and proving unreliable. A city manager was appointed in Sims Ely of Arizona, who ruled with an iron fist while sticking to the strict letter of the rules (no madness for power in that head), and there was no liquor, no gambling, and no prostitution allowed. I'm not sure yet if there was a curfew on the reservation, but there must have been. Actually, I think there was, because workers could go to Las Vegas, where they invariably did to spend their paychecks and have fun (those without families, of course), but if they were late getting back, they weren't allowed back on the reservation until the next morning, and I'm sure Mr. Ely had a few words for them.
Long after Boulder City passed from government to municipal hands, some of the same rules have stayed. There is alcohol now, but there's no gambling and no prostitution. That's mainly what helps keep the peace in Boulder City, that and the overwhelming friendliness of its residents and those who work there. I'm not sure if I would move there yet. For one, I'm close to becoming an employee of the Clark County School District as a library assistant, but I need to establish myself, and I could only get there if I know of a vacancy in the elementary school library there, and that I could transfer into it. But I need to accrue time working in the district.
Not only that, though. There is TuTu's, and there is a Vons supermarket at the edge of town, and restaurants, and those antique stores, and the Boulder City Library, but if you need socks, or shoes, or jeans, you have to drive to Henderson, or Las Vegas if you want to go that far. But it's not that difficult because my friend's former co-worker lives in Las Vegas on Windmill Lane, and commutes to Boulder City. It's much calmer there, which is probably what attracted her to it. However, you're obviously using gas to get to where you need to go from Boulder City, 14 miles out, however many miles it is to where you want to go (and there's also no movie theater in Boulder City, but the nearby Hacienda Hotel and Casino has a two-screen theater. For anything more extensive, there's Henderson or Las Vegas), however many miles back, and then those 14 miles back into Boulder City. But I'm gauging it based on where I currently am in Las Vegas. In Henderson, which we're moving to in September, it's closer to Boulder City. Five or so miles are shaved off of the drive. It may not be for me for now, but I'm still considering moving there when I retire.
Getting to the title of this post, there's always a hullabaloo in city history about ghosts living in the Boulder Dam Hotel, and it's likely true. My friend said that when she stayed there for six weeks to learn a new job within the Bureau of Reclamation after two years with the Bureau in Yuma, Arizona, she heard noises all around, and it wouldn't surprise me because the Hotel has changed ownership so many times and gone through so many iterations that it's never able to rest. But when my friend and I walked through Boulder City, I felt like there were more ghosts than just those in the Boulder Dam Hotel. I noticed them there, too, when I was with my family, going to the Boulder Dam Museum on the second floor, way in the back. I didn't hear the noises, but I could sense that the building was steeped in enough history that there were more figures wanting their stories told. I would be more interested as to why they ended up in the hotel. What keeps them there? Is it a kind of purgatory unknown to us? Or do they feel most at home there? I don't have a hardcore belief in ghosts, but I think that with some towns' focus on its history, like Buena Park where Knott's Berry Farm is, where its history hangs so heavily, there is a better chance that ghosts are around, wanting to be noticed, wanting their stories to be told.
Goatfeathers is where I began sensing those ghosts. Not sensing like ghost hunters do, but a feeling about it. I know that antique stores are fertile ground for ghosts anyway because of all kinds of things left behind either by death or by not needing them anymore. They all have stories. Sitting in front of me is a model of a 19th-century Victoria house in Charlotte, North Carolina. I bought this because it's the kind of house I wish I had if I didn't mind, and could afford, upkeep, and I had more money than God on a Wednesday. It's not only that this house was of the 19th century. It's that this sat somewhere in someone's house, maybe someone who collected models of houses like this one, who explored the different styles of houses, tracing them through history, trends based on the time period, perhaps.
In fact, when I looked around in Goatfeathers, I had this overwhelming feeling of wanting to tell stories about so many items there. Take, for example, some of the glasses I found. I could write a short story about the glass, either in a cupboard, or where it might have come from, or who used it. If I could find out where it had been, it would be eerie if I found out that the short story I wrote was accurate. It's not only that Goatfeathers encourages you to look around, but it also invites you to sniff out potential history of all that it stocks. We'll never know what the history was, but we can tell stories from what we feel about the history of those objects when we look at them. I think there are ghosts of sorts in Goatfeathers. They want their stories to be told. I don't think they care if those stories are accurate, which they're not meant to be. They just want to be noticed.
Down that hill, into the park, the ghosts were there, too. An old turbine from Hoover Dam sits in one section of the park, and it's part of it, but it's the same thing with those ghosts in the park, too, the ones who have lived there as humans, who have loved it: Find the story you want to tell, and that's acknowledgement enough for us. Even if it's just the atmosphere, that's good enough.
The history of Las Vegas is there, but you really have to dig for it. In my mobile home park, I sense its history only when it rains (as it will on Friday), and the sky remains gloomy with the threat of more rain. Otherwise, you have to dig. The Strip doesn't offer any time for reflection, but then, that's not the point of it. At least there are books that reveal all. But in Boulder City, the present and the past co-exist as peacefully as the landscape.
It's 4:49 p.m. The sun is getting ready to set here. But in my mind, I'm back in Boulder City, in that park, waiting for the streetlights to grow brighter as the sky gets darker, feeling so at peace that that's where I want to be forever. We're going back on Saturday, during the day, so Mom can see what Goatfeathers is like, and to eat wherever we're going to eat. There are so many restaurants in Boulder City, that while I thought of Mel's Diner because they have patty melts, which I love, Mom bookmarked the tripadvisor list of Boulder City restaurants, and I spotted Boulder PIT Stop, which also has burgers. So that's another one to consider. And Dad and Meridith haven't seen the list yet, so they may have other ideas too. It's great to have these choices again! But no matter if we decide on something that's far off from my original thought of Mel's Diner, I will have the Boulder City I love. It looks even more beautiful at sunset, but during the day, there's that same peace. No tension. Just history and the possibility of so many stories to explore. And the ghosts. They're always happy to know you're there. They want you there. So come in and wander. The peace will touch you too.
I want to move into TuTu's. The next day, I thought about where the biography section was, overlooking another block of stores, where I saw a man and a woman walking a dog below, and I wanted to replace the biography section with a bed for myself. I wouldn't need as big a TV as I have now. Just one to bring in Jeopardy!, The Big Bang Theory, and How It's Made, along with a DVD player for my movies. But being that I would have not only the books in TuTu's, but also my own collection, plus being within walking distance of the Boulder City Library, I don't think I'd watch TV all that often. Not that I do now anyway. For example, I Tivo'd Monday Mornings on TNT last night, which I want to see because it's based on a novel by Sanjay Gupta that I really like. I still haven't gotten to it.
We went to Goatfeathers, which is the largest antique store I've ever seen, with two upstairs areas, one of them for dishes and mugs and other kitchen supplies. And we went to another antique store where they've got a good handle on furniture, armoires and sturdy squat bookcases that I'd be hard-pressed to find in such good condition at the average furniture store. Later, we went to the Boulder Dam Brewing Co. for dinner, where I had an excellent blue cheese burger and the fries were pretty good, too.
But all that paled in importance, though refocused itself later, in comparison to the parking lot behind the Bureau of Reclamation building, where I was led to see the view of Lake Mead from there. I saw houses stretching to the lake, mountains cradling the lake, and I found the meaning of life. I felt such inner peace that I don't think I've ever felt before, not like this, not as pronounced. The other time I did, though it was far less than this, was every Friday in Pembroke Pines, in our development at Grand Palms, when I came home from school, and the sunlight through the trees, golden on the sidewalks, made it feel like the universe was aligned.
Then came the biggest discovery of all: Finding peace on Earth. We had bumped into my friend's former co-worker at that Bureau of Reclamation building, and she took us up to her office to see the view of Lake Mead from her window, which was also spectacular, but I always need the air around me in order to appreciate that view. I chatted with her for a few minutes, and then it was time to go, since she had work to do, even though it was a Saturday. But she had the right idea since there was no noise in the building, it was totally quiet, and certainly you could get a lot done that way. I told her that when I was in middle school and my teachers made us get in groups, I hated it because I always knew I could get the work done faster on my own. Ironic that those teachers were promoting socialization, yet would always tell us to be quiet and get to work.
We walked downstairs, back to the entrance/exit of the building, pushed the door open to the outside, went out, and went down the short stairs that rise to, and fall from, the building. In front of us was the half-bowl shaped park for dog walkers, joggers, and people like us, just strolling and looking around.
We started down the lip of the half-bowl, down that hill, and even though I couldn't see the sunset happening at that moment, I could feel it. The streetlights had come on, no sickly orangish glow here. Pure, gentle white lights. I looked at those lights in the park, and across the street at other buildings, and I felt peace on Earth. As my friend's former co-worker reminded me when I exclaimed my love of Boulder City, it is a unique situation. And she's right. Boulder City was created by the government to house the workers building Hoover (then Boulder) Dam, because they didn't want them living in Las Vegas, getting caught up in that debauched (their perception) lifestyle, and proving unreliable. A city manager was appointed in Sims Ely of Arizona, who ruled with an iron fist while sticking to the strict letter of the rules (no madness for power in that head), and there was no liquor, no gambling, and no prostitution allowed. I'm not sure yet if there was a curfew on the reservation, but there must have been. Actually, I think there was, because workers could go to Las Vegas, where they invariably did to spend their paychecks and have fun (those without families, of course), but if they were late getting back, they weren't allowed back on the reservation until the next morning, and I'm sure Mr. Ely had a few words for them.
Long after Boulder City passed from government to municipal hands, some of the same rules have stayed. There is alcohol now, but there's no gambling and no prostitution. That's mainly what helps keep the peace in Boulder City, that and the overwhelming friendliness of its residents and those who work there. I'm not sure if I would move there yet. For one, I'm close to becoming an employee of the Clark County School District as a library assistant, but I need to establish myself, and I could only get there if I know of a vacancy in the elementary school library there, and that I could transfer into it. But I need to accrue time working in the district.
Not only that, though. There is TuTu's, and there is a Vons supermarket at the edge of town, and restaurants, and those antique stores, and the Boulder City Library, but if you need socks, or shoes, or jeans, you have to drive to Henderson, or Las Vegas if you want to go that far. But it's not that difficult because my friend's former co-worker lives in Las Vegas on Windmill Lane, and commutes to Boulder City. It's much calmer there, which is probably what attracted her to it. However, you're obviously using gas to get to where you need to go from Boulder City, 14 miles out, however many miles it is to where you want to go (and there's also no movie theater in Boulder City, but the nearby Hacienda Hotel and Casino has a two-screen theater. For anything more extensive, there's Henderson or Las Vegas), however many miles back, and then those 14 miles back into Boulder City. But I'm gauging it based on where I currently am in Las Vegas. In Henderson, which we're moving to in September, it's closer to Boulder City. Five or so miles are shaved off of the drive. It may not be for me for now, but I'm still considering moving there when I retire.
Getting to the title of this post, there's always a hullabaloo in city history about ghosts living in the Boulder Dam Hotel, and it's likely true. My friend said that when she stayed there for six weeks to learn a new job within the Bureau of Reclamation after two years with the Bureau in Yuma, Arizona, she heard noises all around, and it wouldn't surprise me because the Hotel has changed ownership so many times and gone through so many iterations that it's never able to rest. But when my friend and I walked through Boulder City, I felt like there were more ghosts than just those in the Boulder Dam Hotel. I noticed them there, too, when I was with my family, going to the Boulder Dam Museum on the second floor, way in the back. I didn't hear the noises, but I could sense that the building was steeped in enough history that there were more figures wanting their stories told. I would be more interested as to why they ended up in the hotel. What keeps them there? Is it a kind of purgatory unknown to us? Or do they feel most at home there? I don't have a hardcore belief in ghosts, but I think that with some towns' focus on its history, like Buena Park where Knott's Berry Farm is, where its history hangs so heavily, there is a better chance that ghosts are around, wanting to be noticed, wanting their stories to be told.
Goatfeathers is where I began sensing those ghosts. Not sensing like ghost hunters do, but a feeling about it. I know that antique stores are fertile ground for ghosts anyway because of all kinds of things left behind either by death or by not needing them anymore. They all have stories. Sitting in front of me is a model of a 19th-century Victoria house in Charlotte, North Carolina. I bought this because it's the kind of house I wish I had if I didn't mind, and could afford, upkeep, and I had more money than God on a Wednesday. It's not only that this house was of the 19th century. It's that this sat somewhere in someone's house, maybe someone who collected models of houses like this one, who explored the different styles of houses, tracing them through history, trends based on the time period, perhaps.
In fact, when I looked around in Goatfeathers, I had this overwhelming feeling of wanting to tell stories about so many items there. Take, for example, some of the glasses I found. I could write a short story about the glass, either in a cupboard, or where it might have come from, or who used it. If I could find out where it had been, it would be eerie if I found out that the short story I wrote was accurate. It's not only that Goatfeathers encourages you to look around, but it also invites you to sniff out potential history of all that it stocks. We'll never know what the history was, but we can tell stories from what we feel about the history of those objects when we look at them. I think there are ghosts of sorts in Goatfeathers. They want their stories to be told. I don't think they care if those stories are accurate, which they're not meant to be. They just want to be noticed.
Down that hill, into the park, the ghosts were there, too. An old turbine from Hoover Dam sits in one section of the park, and it's part of it, but it's the same thing with those ghosts in the park, too, the ones who have lived there as humans, who have loved it: Find the story you want to tell, and that's acknowledgement enough for us. Even if it's just the atmosphere, that's good enough.
The history of Las Vegas is there, but you really have to dig for it. In my mobile home park, I sense its history only when it rains (as it will on Friday), and the sky remains gloomy with the threat of more rain. Otherwise, you have to dig. The Strip doesn't offer any time for reflection, but then, that's not the point of it. At least there are books that reveal all. But in Boulder City, the present and the past co-exist as peacefully as the landscape.
It's 4:49 p.m. The sun is getting ready to set here. But in my mind, I'm back in Boulder City, in that park, waiting for the streetlights to grow brighter as the sky gets darker, feeling so at peace that that's where I want to be forever. We're going back on Saturday, during the day, so Mom can see what Goatfeathers is like, and to eat wherever we're going to eat. There are so many restaurants in Boulder City, that while I thought of Mel's Diner because they have patty melts, which I love, Mom bookmarked the tripadvisor list of Boulder City restaurants, and I spotted Boulder PIT Stop, which also has burgers. So that's another one to consider. And Dad and Meridith haven't seen the list yet, so they may have other ideas too. It's great to have these choices again! But no matter if we decide on something that's far off from my original thought of Mel's Diner, I will have the Boulder City I love. It looks even more beautiful at sunset, but during the day, there's that same peace. No tension. Just history and the possibility of so many stories to explore. And the ghosts. They're always happy to know you're there. They want you there. So come in and wander. The peace will touch you too.
Wednesday, January 2, 2013
Home is a Library That Knows Me
I like the Whitney Library because it has books, just like I like any library that has books. Any library is my temple because of that. But most of the books I check out from the Whitney Library are from other branches, books that I've put on hold during the week, before my usual Sunday visit, the result of deciding what I want to read the following week, what I want to research for the books I want to write, what would excite me, what would make me curious.
Whitney is an ok branch. It has a much, much larger children's section, an entire room of its own, which I've never seen in any other library I've been to, not even in Florida. It's still part of the library building, but it's its own world, with shelves of picture books just the right height for little kids to find the books they want. There's also a much smaller teen section that also has its own quiet feel, even though it doesn't have the benefit of being as removed as the children's section is. It faces part of where the most foot traffic is, a stretch between the entrance of the library and the fiction and nonfiction sections. But it is quiet enough for any bookish teens to find a sanctuary there for themselves.
Yet, this isn't my library. I don't walk in and feel truly at home. It's necessary for me, it's valuable, but it's basically a weekly refueling stop. I go in, I get the books I want, I sometimes find a title on one of the fiction shelves that I put on hold on my library card for next week, and I leave. There's no connection, no sense of closeness. Even if I spent more time than just the usual half an hour, I don't think I would find it. The closest I've felt to any part of the Whitney Library is a multi-volume set of American surnames, of which I paged through one volume to see what would make a good presidential surname for one of the novels I want to write. If I was to spend more time at Whitney, it would only be for more time with that set.
I have visited my home library twice, though. Once when we were tourists of Southern Nevada, and on New Year's Eve, which was also Mom's birthday. She wanted to visit Boulder City again, which made me deliriously happy because I consider Boulder City my true home. I love Las Vegas, I love that dreams can become reality there, that the strangest visions you might sometimes have are probably somewhere in the city. But inasmuch as I want to write for the tourist publications I've seen that tout and brag and crow about everything there is to do in Las Vegas, I'm not the kind of person who always enjoys the tumult of the Strip, the crowds, the thousands of slot machines, the millions of ways in which you can either spend or lose your money. I do know that the Strip moves more slowly than the media would have you believe, but it's not slow enough for me. Boulder City is utter peace. Boulder City moves gently. It doesn't rush for anything. It doesn't create the latest hype. It doesn't try to get you to go here and go there and eat here and play over there. In fact, gambling is still outlawed in Boulder City, as it was when it started as the first planned community in the United States, built by the government to house workers who were building Hoover Dam. No gambling, no drinking, no untoward behavior that would get you kicked off the reservation, sometimes for a day, sometimes for good, depending on the severity of what you did. Boulder City isn't that strict anymore, but development of any sort is slow because that's the way the city wants it. I love the downtown area because instead of passing by the antique shops and restaurants and candy stores you see, you mosey on by. You take your time. You enjoy what you see, and become curious about what more there is. On its own, the Boulder City Cemetery is peaceful enough, but that kind of peace is spread out through all of Boulder City. It may happen earlier, depending on the years ahead, but when I retire, I want to move to Boulder City. I don't mind how quiet the town is. I don't mind that everything pretty much closes up shop by the early evening. All I need are my books, my writing, and the promise that those stores and the downtown area entirely will be open the next day for me to mosey on through if I want.
That includes the Boulder City Library, which is part of the Las Vegas-Clark County Library District, but also has its own website. Its rules are more stringent than any other Las Vegas-Clark County branch, such as a maximum of four people at any table, but it makes for a far more pleasant experience, such as the one I had on Mom's birthday, with the library our last stop before we drove out of the city to search for the Hacienda Hotel and Casino, near Hoover Dam.
When you walk in, you enter a small rotunda that has pictures of Boulder City's residents, men who worked on the Hoover Dam. There's a picture of one man scaling one of the many rock walls, another slightly colored of a man standing there with construction going on behind him, and my favorite, three men having lunch. Then, hung on a wall across from where you stand is an enormous quilt portraying a tall bookcase, created by a quilting club in 2004, each section done by a different member.
When I walked into the library proper, I knew exactly what I wanted: The Nevada Room. I believe the Boulder City Library has the only room devoted to Nevada history. In this room are books about Nevada, Las Vegas, Boulder City, Hoover Dam, and the Southwest in general. There are maps and documents to carefully examine, and reference books to peruse. There are two long tables, a collection of chairs, and framed pictures on the wall showing off various aspects of Nevada's history. When I first saw this room as a tourist, I wanted to read every book I found there. I still do, and though I can't physically check out each book from that room at the Boulder City Library, I know that when I look them up in the library catalog, chances are that Boulder City will be the only branch to have that particular book.
First, however, I wanted to find one book to check out. I was returning Tooter Pepperday by Jerry Spinelli, which I had finished reading the day before New Year's Eve. I knew what I wanted to check out, but it was all more than one book. There were a few Nero Wolfe novels by Rex Stout that I knew the Boulder City Library had. Oscar Levant published The Memoirs of an Amnesiac in 1965, and I knew Boulder City had what felt like a first edition when I saw it. You see, Boulder City is a safe haven for old books. It's hard to find a book that's over five years old in the Whitney Library. Not in copyright, but in whatever edition it is. For example, the copy of The Betsy by Harold Robbins that I checked out from the Whitney Library was from Boulder City. It was published in 1971, and this copy looks like it was from 1971. But it's well cared for. Books seem to be stitched up there when they need to be, new binding applied, new plastic covering given. Every word, every sentence, every page is important here.
I walked passed the Young Adult Fiction section, which is in an alcove next to the entrance. There are long shelves of books there, and while I was looking for The Memoirs of an Amnesiac, I stopped to look for any of Jerry Spinelli's novels, and smiled when I spotted Love, Stargirl, which was part of a box set I bought from Amazon that included Stargirl, the first novel, and a free journal. It was the first time I bought a book before I finished it, Love, Stargirl having been checked out from the library. I knew I needed both books only halfway through the sequel.
The biography section, on the opposite side of the library, didn't have The Memoirs of an Amnesiac. When I looked it up just now, I found that it's on a holdshelf for someone else.
I went to the fiction section, which was a revelation because I didn't have to squeeze past any shelves! I could comfortably walk past them, unlike at the Whitney Library where you have to decide if it's you or your tote bag full of books that's going to go through. Here, I reached the Nero Wolfe novels without having to tell my tote bag, "I love you! Never forget me!" Not to mention that I didn't have to bring my tote bag this time because I had reached my 50-item limit on Monday, as always.
I still have Fer-De-Lance, The League of Frightened Men, The Rubber Band, and The Red Box to read. I ordered them toward the end of my trying years in Santa Clarita, and moved them here with the rest of my books. I'd rather see where I get with those four. I've always liked the series, but I only have a yen for certain books at certain times. This week would have been Nero Wolfe's time if ghost stories hadn't gotten in the way, which I want to read to see how ghost stories were told throughout literature as I plan my own novels that are in the same realm. I'll probably be influenced by a few of them, but I mostly want to figure out the blueprints for these books, how these authors did it, what kind of devices they employed.
As I walked past the "A" authors on the far left wall of the fiction section, I spotted Timbuktu by Paul Auster and immediately reached for it and pulled it down. It's about a dog named Mr. Bones and his dying companion, Willie G. Christmas, as they try to find Bea Swanson, Willie's former teacher and greatest influence in his life, so that Willie can give Bea the key to the locker at the Greyhound station that contains all his manuscripts, and so that Mr. Bones can have a home instead of having to fend for himself after Willie dies. I first read it in September 2008, as I found out earlier today on my Goodreads account, and even though I hadn't thought about it since then, it must have stuck in my mind, because I wanted to check it out to see if I wanted it in my permanent collection. Was it really that good then? That first time, it must have been.
I carried it with me as I finally approached the Nevada Room. Timbuktu was my top choice, but maybe there was something in here that I'd want more.
The Nevada Room has silent reverence toward the state it represents in the books it holds. You come in here and it feels like you can know all of Nevada just by touching the books, not even picking one up and skimming the pages. I wouldn't go so far to say that there are spirits roaming this room, but there is a definite sense of history that would excite any Nevada knowledge seeker, like me. If ever I use this as a quiet research room, I know it'll always be welcoming and exude less expectation than the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' Margaret Herrick Library did. No one's above you in this library and in this room. It's all yours, to seek out whatever you want.
I found an anthology called Literary Nevada that I went to the computer across from the check-out desk to put on hold because I knew by this time that I'd check out Timbuktu. I wanted it again. The only other book I wanted from the Nevada Room was Walking the Twilight: Women Writers of the Southwest, another anthology, and I put that on hold too. Later, when I checked my account before we left, I found that the copy in transit to the Whitney Library was the one I had held not even an hour before. There's a lot of other books from the Nevada Room that I want to read, and I know I don't have to memorize any titles. I'll find them in the catalog and they'll quickly be familiar again.
Mom loves this library as much as I do, and it's mainly because of the magazine collection they have. I didn't count, but I estimate that the library subscribes to at least 70 magazines. At the Whitney Library, the magazine room is barely a cubbyhole and it only seems to have the current basics, such as People. Here, you can find so much more, including "Aviation Week and Space Technology," "Trains," and others I've unfortunately already forgotten, except for one.
I knew this was my library because of its peacefulness, because of its appreciation for old books, because it still has its card catalog, even though they prefer the online version. But it also does what any library worth its weight in book gold should: It knows you. The librarians may not know you all that well and the only moments you may spend with them, at least at the Boulder City Library, is when you check out books (At Whitney, you use a self-checkout system and a human is only there if you have any questions regarding your library card. For anything else, you go to the reference desk). But the library knows. The library knows what you gravitate to as soon as you arrive, what you like to read, what you're looking for.
I went down the rows of magazines on the left side of the tables and chairs in between both parts, and then the magazines on the right side. I was surprised to find "New Mexico Magazine," which, until this moment, I didn't even know existed. I took it to the table where Mom was, sat down, opened it up, and took out my phone to put names of some of the writers in the magazine and book titles into a text message in my phone to look up later.
New Mexico Magazine. In the past couple of weeks, I've let subscriptions to "Oxford American" and "Poets & Writers" run out because they didn't feel like they fit me anymore. I like the writing in "Oxford American," but I'm not in the South anymore. Not that that's any reason not to read Southern writing, which I still do, but that's not me right now. I want to travel throughout New Mexico in the years to come. What better way to begin learning more about the state? I'm thinking of subscribing to it. $19.95 for 12 issues sounds like a good deal, better than what I'd have to pay to renew my subscription to "The New Yorker" if it was expiring now instead of September 2014.
After Mom was done with the magazines she was reading and we headed to the exit, we stopped at the new books which take up a few shelves directly across from the check-out desk. Mom was confused before because in the fiction section in the back, there were signs that said "Coming Soon" and she mistakenly thought that those were new books that hadn't been cataloged into the system yet. All of them. She hadn't noticed that under "Coming Soon" was a pair of handcuffs, and some other images related to murder mysteries.
The Boulder City Library is doing a Winter Mystery Reading Program that starts in two weeks, and it was advertised all throughout the library. This is Boulder City's own program. No other Las Vegas-Clark County branch is doing this. That's one of the signs of a strong community, that the library creates programs like this and actively promotes them. For this, there will be book discussions, and movies, and a Clue-themed party. If I was living in Boulder City, I'd go to all of it.
While looking at the new books, I found that the library knew me very well because sitting next to a book called Don't Know Much About the American Presidents by Kenneth C. Davis, which I put on hold after I got home, I spotted Fifteen One-Act Plays by Sam Shepard, one of my heroes. It was an expanded edition of The Unseen Hand and Other Plays, likely including more plays, possibly his latest works if there have been any. Presidents and Sam Shepard side by side, as well as another book called A Slave in the White House by Elizabeth Dowling Taylor, about Paul Jennings, a slave that was born on the plantation of James and Dolley Madison, who later became part of their staff at the White House. This is the library I want for all time. This is the library that knows me well. The Boulder City Library is not a refueling stop for me; it is the sanctuary I've always wanted. I know that we're going back to Boulder City possibly in the next few months, if not sooner, but I don't know how often I'd be able to get to this library otherwise. Boulder City is only 12 miles from where we are in Las Vegas, but it feels like another world, another life, with a lot of hills to drive over, and a higher elevation. You can't see Las Vegas from anywhere in Boulder City. I don't feel pressured or rushed by anything in Las Vegas, but if you ever want to breathe more easily, Boulder City is where you go for a while. I'd rather be there forever. I would never be bored there. And to have a library that knows who I am, and what I want in my life, is something I cherish and hold close. After this library visit, I can't see the Whitney Library for more than what it doesn't have compared to Boulder City. That's not fair to Whitney, I know. A library with a lot of books to choose from is still good and necessary. It's what I live for. But after we left the new books, before we reached the door, we saw on a bulletin board easel that the library was asking kids to make snowflakes that would be sent to the kids at Sandy Hook Elementary. That is what community means. I know it's at the Whitney Library too, though not as easily found, but it's much stronger in Boulder City. I belong there for that reason, for many reasons.
Mom's main concern is that if we move to Boulder City, what we feel about it will diminish because we'd be there every day. I don't think so. For one, it's the one place in Southern Nevada that truly feels peaceful. But also, I've never lived in a small town.
A few weeks ago, I met another neighbor in our mobile home park, a 60-70-something woman who had lived in Minnesota all her life and moved out here for the freedom to do whatever you want because in Minnesota, she was surrounded by people who wanted to do this and do that and why don't they meet there and go to that restaurant later? Not family, not all the time I'm sure, but neighbors always in each other's business.
Boulder City has the same sense of separation that Las Vegas and Henderson do. People go on about their lives and you're doing this and they're somewhere else. For friendliness, you can't beat Boulder City. For me, Casselberry was a suburb outside of Orlando, Coral Springs and Pembroke Pines were just small cities. I feel like I can walk around downtown Boulder City and find something different that interests me every time, while always having the opportunity to go back to what I love.
There are disadvantages, such as supermarkets and bigger shopping centers not being close by. If you need to go to Target or Walmart, you have to drive for a while. The only movie theater nearby is two screens at the Hacienda Hotel and Casino and that's closed and opened a few times already, with this latest attempt seeming to be the most successful.
It's a balance, though. You have to decide what you want, what you can live with, and can live without having as often as you've had it. I don't think we'll be moving there soon, or for many years. Henderson seems more what we need right now if we move again. It's a little further from the Strip and downtown Las Vegas, but it has almost as relaxed a lifestyle as Boulder City, but with a lot more traffic and shopping centers.
There's time, years and decades, in fact. But whenever I go to the Whitney Library, or to the main Clark County branch, neither can compare to my home. It's everything I could ever want in a library.
Whitney is an ok branch. It has a much, much larger children's section, an entire room of its own, which I've never seen in any other library I've been to, not even in Florida. It's still part of the library building, but it's its own world, with shelves of picture books just the right height for little kids to find the books they want. There's also a much smaller teen section that also has its own quiet feel, even though it doesn't have the benefit of being as removed as the children's section is. It faces part of where the most foot traffic is, a stretch between the entrance of the library and the fiction and nonfiction sections. But it is quiet enough for any bookish teens to find a sanctuary there for themselves.
Yet, this isn't my library. I don't walk in and feel truly at home. It's necessary for me, it's valuable, but it's basically a weekly refueling stop. I go in, I get the books I want, I sometimes find a title on one of the fiction shelves that I put on hold on my library card for next week, and I leave. There's no connection, no sense of closeness. Even if I spent more time than just the usual half an hour, I don't think I would find it. The closest I've felt to any part of the Whitney Library is a multi-volume set of American surnames, of which I paged through one volume to see what would make a good presidential surname for one of the novels I want to write. If I was to spend more time at Whitney, it would only be for more time with that set.
I have visited my home library twice, though. Once when we were tourists of Southern Nevada, and on New Year's Eve, which was also Mom's birthday. She wanted to visit Boulder City again, which made me deliriously happy because I consider Boulder City my true home. I love Las Vegas, I love that dreams can become reality there, that the strangest visions you might sometimes have are probably somewhere in the city. But inasmuch as I want to write for the tourist publications I've seen that tout and brag and crow about everything there is to do in Las Vegas, I'm not the kind of person who always enjoys the tumult of the Strip, the crowds, the thousands of slot machines, the millions of ways in which you can either spend or lose your money. I do know that the Strip moves more slowly than the media would have you believe, but it's not slow enough for me. Boulder City is utter peace. Boulder City moves gently. It doesn't rush for anything. It doesn't create the latest hype. It doesn't try to get you to go here and go there and eat here and play over there. In fact, gambling is still outlawed in Boulder City, as it was when it started as the first planned community in the United States, built by the government to house workers who were building Hoover Dam. No gambling, no drinking, no untoward behavior that would get you kicked off the reservation, sometimes for a day, sometimes for good, depending on the severity of what you did. Boulder City isn't that strict anymore, but development of any sort is slow because that's the way the city wants it. I love the downtown area because instead of passing by the antique shops and restaurants and candy stores you see, you mosey on by. You take your time. You enjoy what you see, and become curious about what more there is. On its own, the Boulder City Cemetery is peaceful enough, but that kind of peace is spread out through all of Boulder City. It may happen earlier, depending on the years ahead, but when I retire, I want to move to Boulder City. I don't mind how quiet the town is. I don't mind that everything pretty much closes up shop by the early evening. All I need are my books, my writing, and the promise that those stores and the downtown area entirely will be open the next day for me to mosey on through if I want.
That includes the Boulder City Library, which is part of the Las Vegas-Clark County Library District, but also has its own website. Its rules are more stringent than any other Las Vegas-Clark County branch, such as a maximum of four people at any table, but it makes for a far more pleasant experience, such as the one I had on Mom's birthday, with the library our last stop before we drove out of the city to search for the Hacienda Hotel and Casino, near Hoover Dam.
When you walk in, you enter a small rotunda that has pictures of Boulder City's residents, men who worked on the Hoover Dam. There's a picture of one man scaling one of the many rock walls, another slightly colored of a man standing there with construction going on behind him, and my favorite, three men having lunch. Then, hung on a wall across from where you stand is an enormous quilt portraying a tall bookcase, created by a quilting club in 2004, each section done by a different member.
When I walked into the library proper, I knew exactly what I wanted: The Nevada Room. I believe the Boulder City Library has the only room devoted to Nevada history. In this room are books about Nevada, Las Vegas, Boulder City, Hoover Dam, and the Southwest in general. There are maps and documents to carefully examine, and reference books to peruse. There are two long tables, a collection of chairs, and framed pictures on the wall showing off various aspects of Nevada's history. When I first saw this room as a tourist, I wanted to read every book I found there. I still do, and though I can't physically check out each book from that room at the Boulder City Library, I know that when I look them up in the library catalog, chances are that Boulder City will be the only branch to have that particular book.
First, however, I wanted to find one book to check out. I was returning Tooter Pepperday by Jerry Spinelli, which I had finished reading the day before New Year's Eve. I knew what I wanted to check out, but it was all more than one book. There were a few Nero Wolfe novels by Rex Stout that I knew the Boulder City Library had. Oscar Levant published The Memoirs of an Amnesiac in 1965, and I knew Boulder City had what felt like a first edition when I saw it. You see, Boulder City is a safe haven for old books. It's hard to find a book that's over five years old in the Whitney Library. Not in copyright, but in whatever edition it is. For example, the copy of The Betsy by Harold Robbins that I checked out from the Whitney Library was from Boulder City. It was published in 1971, and this copy looks like it was from 1971. But it's well cared for. Books seem to be stitched up there when they need to be, new binding applied, new plastic covering given. Every word, every sentence, every page is important here.
I walked passed the Young Adult Fiction section, which is in an alcove next to the entrance. There are long shelves of books there, and while I was looking for The Memoirs of an Amnesiac, I stopped to look for any of Jerry Spinelli's novels, and smiled when I spotted Love, Stargirl, which was part of a box set I bought from Amazon that included Stargirl, the first novel, and a free journal. It was the first time I bought a book before I finished it, Love, Stargirl having been checked out from the library. I knew I needed both books only halfway through the sequel.
The biography section, on the opposite side of the library, didn't have The Memoirs of an Amnesiac. When I looked it up just now, I found that it's on a holdshelf for someone else.
I went to the fiction section, which was a revelation because I didn't have to squeeze past any shelves! I could comfortably walk past them, unlike at the Whitney Library where you have to decide if it's you or your tote bag full of books that's going to go through. Here, I reached the Nero Wolfe novels without having to tell my tote bag, "I love you! Never forget me!" Not to mention that I didn't have to bring my tote bag this time because I had reached my 50-item limit on Monday, as always.
I still have Fer-De-Lance, The League of Frightened Men, The Rubber Band, and The Red Box to read. I ordered them toward the end of my trying years in Santa Clarita, and moved them here with the rest of my books. I'd rather see where I get with those four. I've always liked the series, but I only have a yen for certain books at certain times. This week would have been Nero Wolfe's time if ghost stories hadn't gotten in the way, which I want to read to see how ghost stories were told throughout literature as I plan my own novels that are in the same realm. I'll probably be influenced by a few of them, but I mostly want to figure out the blueprints for these books, how these authors did it, what kind of devices they employed.
As I walked past the "A" authors on the far left wall of the fiction section, I spotted Timbuktu by Paul Auster and immediately reached for it and pulled it down. It's about a dog named Mr. Bones and his dying companion, Willie G. Christmas, as they try to find Bea Swanson, Willie's former teacher and greatest influence in his life, so that Willie can give Bea the key to the locker at the Greyhound station that contains all his manuscripts, and so that Mr. Bones can have a home instead of having to fend for himself after Willie dies. I first read it in September 2008, as I found out earlier today on my Goodreads account, and even though I hadn't thought about it since then, it must have stuck in my mind, because I wanted to check it out to see if I wanted it in my permanent collection. Was it really that good then? That first time, it must have been.
I carried it with me as I finally approached the Nevada Room. Timbuktu was my top choice, but maybe there was something in here that I'd want more.
The Nevada Room has silent reverence toward the state it represents in the books it holds. You come in here and it feels like you can know all of Nevada just by touching the books, not even picking one up and skimming the pages. I wouldn't go so far to say that there are spirits roaming this room, but there is a definite sense of history that would excite any Nevada knowledge seeker, like me. If ever I use this as a quiet research room, I know it'll always be welcoming and exude less expectation than the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' Margaret Herrick Library did. No one's above you in this library and in this room. It's all yours, to seek out whatever you want.
I found an anthology called Literary Nevada that I went to the computer across from the check-out desk to put on hold because I knew by this time that I'd check out Timbuktu. I wanted it again. The only other book I wanted from the Nevada Room was Walking the Twilight: Women Writers of the Southwest, another anthology, and I put that on hold too. Later, when I checked my account before we left, I found that the copy in transit to the Whitney Library was the one I had held not even an hour before. There's a lot of other books from the Nevada Room that I want to read, and I know I don't have to memorize any titles. I'll find them in the catalog and they'll quickly be familiar again.
Mom loves this library as much as I do, and it's mainly because of the magazine collection they have. I didn't count, but I estimate that the library subscribes to at least 70 magazines. At the Whitney Library, the magazine room is barely a cubbyhole and it only seems to have the current basics, such as People. Here, you can find so much more, including "Aviation Week and Space Technology," "Trains," and others I've unfortunately already forgotten, except for one.
I knew this was my library because of its peacefulness, because of its appreciation for old books, because it still has its card catalog, even though they prefer the online version. But it also does what any library worth its weight in book gold should: It knows you. The librarians may not know you all that well and the only moments you may spend with them, at least at the Boulder City Library, is when you check out books (At Whitney, you use a self-checkout system and a human is only there if you have any questions regarding your library card. For anything else, you go to the reference desk). But the library knows. The library knows what you gravitate to as soon as you arrive, what you like to read, what you're looking for.
I went down the rows of magazines on the left side of the tables and chairs in between both parts, and then the magazines on the right side. I was surprised to find "New Mexico Magazine," which, until this moment, I didn't even know existed. I took it to the table where Mom was, sat down, opened it up, and took out my phone to put names of some of the writers in the magazine and book titles into a text message in my phone to look up later.
New Mexico Magazine. In the past couple of weeks, I've let subscriptions to "Oxford American" and "Poets & Writers" run out because they didn't feel like they fit me anymore. I like the writing in "Oxford American," but I'm not in the South anymore. Not that that's any reason not to read Southern writing, which I still do, but that's not me right now. I want to travel throughout New Mexico in the years to come. What better way to begin learning more about the state? I'm thinking of subscribing to it. $19.95 for 12 issues sounds like a good deal, better than what I'd have to pay to renew my subscription to "The New Yorker" if it was expiring now instead of September 2014.
After Mom was done with the magazines she was reading and we headed to the exit, we stopped at the new books which take up a few shelves directly across from the check-out desk. Mom was confused before because in the fiction section in the back, there were signs that said "Coming Soon" and she mistakenly thought that those were new books that hadn't been cataloged into the system yet. All of them. She hadn't noticed that under "Coming Soon" was a pair of handcuffs, and some other images related to murder mysteries.
The Boulder City Library is doing a Winter Mystery Reading Program that starts in two weeks, and it was advertised all throughout the library. This is Boulder City's own program. No other Las Vegas-Clark County branch is doing this. That's one of the signs of a strong community, that the library creates programs like this and actively promotes them. For this, there will be book discussions, and movies, and a Clue-themed party. If I was living in Boulder City, I'd go to all of it.
While looking at the new books, I found that the library knew me very well because sitting next to a book called Don't Know Much About the American Presidents by Kenneth C. Davis, which I put on hold after I got home, I spotted Fifteen One-Act Plays by Sam Shepard, one of my heroes. It was an expanded edition of The Unseen Hand and Other Plays, likely including more plays, possibly his latest works if there have been any. Presidents and Sam Shepard side by side, as well as another book called A Slave in the White House by Elizabeth Dowling Taylor, about Paul Jennings, a slave that was born on the plantation of James and Dolley Madison, who later became part of their staff at the White House. This is the library I want for all time. This is the library that knows me well. The Boulder City Library is not a refueling stop for me; it is the sanctuary I've always wanted. I know that we're going back to Boulder City possibly in the next few months, if not sooner, but I don't know how often I'd be able to get to this library otherwise. Boulder City is only 12 miles from where we are in Las Vegas, but it feels like another world, another life, with a lot of hills to drive over, and a higher elevation. You can't see Las Vegas from anywhere in Boulder City. I don't feel pressured or rushed by anything in Las Vegas, but if you ever want to breathe more easily, Boulder City is where you go for a while. I'd rather be there forever. I would never be bored there. And to have a library that knows who I am, and what I want in my life, is something I cherish and hold close. After this library visit, I can't see the Whitney Library for more than what it doesn't have compared to Boulder City. That's not fair to Whitney, I know. A library with a lot of books to choose from is still good and necessary. It's what I live for. But after we left the new books, before we reached the door, we saw on a bulletin board easel that the library was asking kids to make snowflakes that would be sent to the kids at Sandy Hook Elementary. That is what community means. I know it's at the Whitney Library too, though not as easily found, but it's much stronger in Boulder City. I belong there for that reason, for many reasons.
Mom's main concern is that if we move to Boulder City, what we feel about it will diminish because we'd be there every day. I don't think so. For one, it's the one place in Southern Nevada that truly feels peaceful. But also, I've never lived in a small town.
A few weeks ago, I met another neighbor in our mobile home park, a 60-70-something woman who had lived in Minnesota all her life and moved out here for the freedom to do whatever you want because in Minnesota, she was surrounded by people who wanted to do this and do that and why don't they meet there and go to that restaurant later? Not family, not all the time I'm sure, but neighbors always in each other's business.
Boulder City has the same sense of separation that Las Vegas and Henderson do. People go on about their lives and you're doing this and they're somewhere else. For friendliness, you can't beat Boulder City. For me, Casselberry was a suburb outside of Orlando, Coral Springs and Pembroke Pines were just small cities. I feel like I can walk around downtown Boulder City and find something different that interests me every time, while always having the opportunity to go back to what I love.
There are disadvantages, such as supermarkets and bigger shopping centers not being close by. If you need to go to Target or Walmart, you have to drive for a while. The only movie theater nearby is two screens at the Hacienda Hotel and Casino and that's closed and opened a few times already, with this latest attempt seeming to be the most successful.
It's a balance, though. You have to decide what you want, what you can live with, and can live without having as often as you've had it. I don't think we'll be moving there soon, or for many years. Henderson seems more what we need right now if we move again. It's a little further from the Strip and downtown Las Vegas, but it has almost as relaxed a lifestyle as Boulder City, but with a lot more traffic and shopping centers.
There's time, years and decades, in fact. But whenever I go to the Whitney Library, or to the main Clark County branch, neither can compare to my home. It's everything I could ever want in a library.
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