Since my move to California, Al has combined visits to me with classes or seminars at Esalen, that former Mecca of the Me Decade in Big Sur. On his way back home to D.C. after a week of self-actualization classes or comedy improv therapy training, he'll meet me at the San Francisco airport and we'll fly off to Las Vegas for a couple of days. It's part of what I call his West Coast Swing, a hybrid journey combining Eastern mysticism, Western pop psychology and $4.95 casino prime rib dinner specials. In this way, he can spend two days replenishing the protein Esalen's menu lacks while practicing the interpersonal skills he's picked up in hot tubs overlooking the Pacific.

When we get to Las Vegas, I try to find unusual attractions or entertainment to attend. We'll go to places like the Irish Porker Pub, where a depressed Elvis impersonator imparts his own middle-aged disillusionments to the King's classic hits, or the threadbare Plaza Hotel downtown to catch the Sunspots. They're a lounge act of 50-ish Filipinos who croon a sexually charged "Hava Negilah/If I Were a Rich Man" medley when they perform during Jewish holidays. I've seen blue-haired widows weep at their soulful tribute to Sammy Davis Jr.

I'm certain that my father, who is now in his late 70s, doesn't find the same humor I do in Elvis' angst-filled crooning or the Sunspots' tribute to our Judaic heritage. But taking him gives me a break from having to hear yet again his Big Revelation, the one about how his own father walloped him for throwing a tantrum because he was asked to go buy some milk when he was 14. It's the same memory he always recalls, the one he dredged up during analysis, group therapy and est, and while having his spinal pulse recalibrated during craniosacral massage training.

On our last Vegas junket, a scheduling glitch resulted in our staying on an extra day, and I ran out of screwball distractions. True to form, he related his awesome discovery.

"This last session at Esalen was the best ever!" he enthused over the din of clanging slot machines. "It is the most effective therapy. It was like a spiritual awakening."

We were standing in the Hard Rock Casino and I was trying to read a few of the countless notes that fans had scribbled hastily and left at the makeshift shrine to Kurt Cobain. Whoops and cheers erupted from a nearby craps table indicating the dice were hot and everyone was in the chips.

"Really? How so?" I squinted through the glass at the little scraps of paper that had been inserted into the display that housed Cobain's jacket and guitar. Their words conveyed conflicting emotions of love for an influential idol and unforgiving anger at the songwriter's self-destruction.

"How so, what?" asked my father.

"You said this session was effective. Tell me what you mean."

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