Las Vegas Weekly

February 10, 2009 · 12:28 PM

Construction crews helped rebuild the sanity

By Justice

Illustration: Justice

Last week Las Vegas played host to the concrete convention. Simultaneously there was a roofing convention in town. People in construction, for whatever reason, happen to be the best strip club customers ever. From construction workers with rough, calloused hands to the men who own construction companies and wear Italian suits, people in construction are always welcome to visit me at work. I worked long shifts and made obscene amounts of money. It is strange, and maybe a little wrong, when you have a good night and count your earnings at the end of a shift and you get a high from it. It’s like a gambler’s high, I suppose. Each night at work is unpredictable, and when you hit big it simply feels good.

Though work was profitable, last week was also a bit of a nightmare for me. I really had a bad episode and I was going to work to make myself feel better. I relished the high of drinking, dancing, and being loved with cash to take my mind off of my misery. In the romance of the black light and loud ’80s music, people tell you you’re beautiful and worthy and that they want to take you all over the world and then home to meet their parents. It stops you from crying for at least a few moments. Something happened in my personal life that put me on a really painful downward spiral. I just snapped. I feel like I’m out of the woods now, but the episode reminded me that I am not as stable as I should be. It was like I was literally inhabited by a different person or parasite or something. It was dangerous for me to be by myself at home and I stayed at work to keep myself on a sort of suicide watch by unbeknownst conventioneers. I just stayed at work as long as possible. When I was in too much physical pain to keep working, I would go home and take sleeping pills and frantically clean the house among other peacefully repetitive activities until the pills kicked in. I vacuumed every piece of unholy lint off the carpet until I was exhausted and redeemed. When I woke up, it was time to work again and abandon reality.

It was one intense cycle. Thank God that episode is over. I’m pretty sure I’m not crazy this week.

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