You see the neon sign and the sign is talking to you in light. The neon sign does not whisper. The neon sign does not suggest. The neon sign shouts in a color that does not exist in nature because neon is a gas and the gas is trapped in a tube and the tube is bent into letters and the letters are electrified and the electrifying is the speaking and the speaking is the selling. The neon sign sells you a beer or a room or a meal or a dance and the selling never stops because the neon never turns off and the never turning off is the promise that the place behind the sign is always open and the always open is the lie the city tells itself at three in the morning.

Georges Claude demonstrated neon gas in a sealed tube at the Paris Motor Show in nineteen ten and the light was so new that the crowd did not have a word for the color. The color was not red and not orange. The color was neon. The color named itself after the gas that made it and the naming was the branding and the branding was instant. By nineteen twenty five neon signs covered the Champs-Elysees and by nineteen thirty they covered Broadway and by nineteen forty they covered every strip of highway in America where a man wanted you to stop your car and spend your money. Neon was the voice of American commerce for fifty years and the voice was loud and the loud was the point.

The Reno Arch has said The Biggest Little City in the World since nineteen twenty six and the saying is the city's entire identity in seven words of neon. The arch spans Virginia Street and the arch has been rebuilt three times and every time the arch comes back with the same seven words because the seven words are Reno and Reno is the seven words. Las Vegas has bigger signs. Times Square has more signs. But Reno has the sign that proves a city can fit inside a sentence and the sentence can be made of light and the light can be the only thing anyone remembers about the city. The neon sign is stronger than the city it advertises.

In the nineteen fifties every motel on Route 66 had a neon sign and the sign was the motel's personality. The Blue Swallow in Tucumcari had a swallow in blue neon. The Wigwam in Holbrook had a teepee in red neon. The signs were folk art made of gas and glass and the folk art was commercial and the commercial was beautiful because the commercial was made by hand. A sign maker bent the tubes over a flame and the bending was a craft and the craft is almost gone because LED is cheaper and LED does not flicker and the not flickering is the problem. Neon flickers. Neon buzzes. Neon has a sound and the sound is the sound of a place that is alive and the alive is what the LED cannot fake.

You drive past the neon sign at night and the sign reflects in the wet street and the reflection doubles the sign and the doubling is free advertising and the free advertising is the rain's gift to the business owner. The neon sign in the rain is the most photographed thing in any city because the neon in the rain is the city at its most cinematic. Every film noir ever made has a neon sign in the rain. The detective stands under the sign and the sign colors his face red or blue and the color is the mood and the mood is the city and the city is the sign and the sign is the light and the light is the only thing standing between the street and the dark.