First Night in the Biggest Little City

Through the middle of Reno, I drove. There were few people on the sidewalks, but soon that would change as it was five or six days ahead of New Year’s Eve.

From the neon of downtown to the outskirts of town, I drove in circles, chasing my tracks and feeling lost. My spirits lifted as I nearly raced over something in the street, a green and white sign that had most recently marked a street corner but now lay broken and discarded.

I stopped and brought it into my car with me: “Humboldt and W. Pueblo,” it read.

“A sign from God, perhaps,” I recall thinking, then chuckling at my wordplay.

Lost, I had no idea where I was in Reno or if I were even still in Reno. But I knew about Humboldt, a place I had left only a few months before, and I took it as evidence that if I should not find my way here, I could always return to the county from where I came and live out the remainders of my days on that coast.

Returning to the main drag, I had to find a place to stop, park, eat, drink, sleep. I drove to the edge of a cemetery and used its parking lot to turn around and head back.

I turned left only to be greeted by a flashing red light in my rearview mirror.

“Did you see the ‘no left turn’ sign?”

“No, sir.”

“Okay, I’m going to let you off with a warning. Please pay more attention.”

“Yes, sir.”

Fifteen minutes later, I returned and again turned and again met the nice cop. No warning. Instead, a 90-dollar ticket and confiscation of my newly found road sign.

I also had to explain where I found the sign.

“Where?”

“On Humboldt, I think.”

“Goodbye, Humboldt,” I whined as I headed to the MGM Grand, possibly the largest building in sight and had somehow missed.