Spoiler: It is kind of about the money… and, unrelated, I’ve decided I’m gonna start saying “ain’t” more often.
So I’ll admit last post I was a little rough on poker. I tore into some people’s (including close friends’) lifetime passions. I told some stories I thought were interesting, but that other people thought were simultaneously too braggadocious and too whiny (not sure how that’s possible). But in case I didn’t make it clear, poker has been a game that has not only financed my life, but also taught me valuable life lessons along the way.
As I explained earlier, I moved to Los Angeles to pursue a music career. One day I went to Commerce Casino to kill some time, and I got into a 9-18 limit holdem game. By today’s standards, I was clueless. I’d heard of “game theory” in some math classes, but I didn’t really know how to apply it other than the Monte Hall problem I wrote about here: https://www.thedisconnectblog.com/blog/2017/10/5/the-game-show-host-problem-in-honor-of-monty-halls-death . Now … I was clueless, but these other players were CLUELESS in capital letters and bold italics. I had a concept of what a good hand was, I never bluffed, and I won something like 600 dollars that day. The next two days went approximately the same way. I was about 22 years old, but this was still the most money I’d ever had in cash in my life.
I’ll admit I fell in love with poker. It was everything I was looking for in a mate. I later found out poker would cheat on me, having fallen in love herself with an older gentleman named “Lee” when she gave him a wheel in 2-7 triple draw when he drew three on the river, and I had the 2nd nuts. But I digress.
By the time I was 18, I was supposed to be an adult, except no one had told me that.
Like I said it wasn’t entirely about the money. it wasn’t even mostly about the money. It was a bypass from the status quo. I’d never liked school. I’d go so far as to say I hated school. It was a terrible environment for processing information and an even worse environment for preparing for life. By the time I was 18, I was supposed to be an adult, except no one had told me that. They showered me with platitudes like “You don’t need a life plan yet. Just go to college. It’s the right thing to do.” I was fortunate enough to have a full scholarship to avoid the student loans that plague many in my generation.
although I’ve long since lost the bitterness, a part of me (and I assume ESPECIALLY the students that took massive loans) resented this coming of age process where we were herded like cattle through something we had been misled about and barely consented to.
I was also fortunate enough to develop a strong relationship with Bacardi in my first year at college. I’m sure you can fill in the blanks, but after my first year in higher education, I decided it wasn’t for me. I couldn’t figure out why I was a societal pariah if I didn’t think a mandated semester of Sociology or Art History was useful for making a living. I started to feel lied to; and, although I’ve long since lost the bitterness, a part of me (and I assume ESPECIALLY the students that took massive loans) resented this coming of age process where we were herded like cattle through something we had been misled about and barely consented to.
Give or take some bad luck, my 21 year-old ego-crazed mind thought “finally, we’re getting what we deserve… and quickly”
****HERE ENTERS A PRAISE SESSION FOR A GAME THAT HAS DONE GREAT THINGS FOR ME****
Fast forward a few alcohol-hazed months or years or something and ENTER POKER. This was the culmination of so many things I thought the world should be. This was basically an anarchist’s meritocracy. If you were smarter than the other players and executed properly, you were INSTANTLY rewarded with money! Give or take some bad luck, my 21 year-old ego-crazed mind thought “finally, we’re getting what we deserve… and quickly.” (This is a reason the private games that have barred the best players from entering really get to me as a stain on the purity of the game’s meritocracy, but I’ll cover that more deeply in a later post).
The social aspect of the game is also amazing and cannot be over-stated. Playing in Los Angeles, you get to rub shoulders (literally) with some of most famous actors, comedians, musicians, entrepreneurs, etc. If I could have remembered my original goal of a career in music in Los Angeles, this was a networking paradise. Unfortunately I was usually too busy ruminating over how poorly I played pocket jacks an hour ago to realize the amazing interactions that were going on around me, but eventually an older, wiser Doug figured out how to converse with strangers; and I’ve since made many friends at the poker table.
I won’t waste too much of your time explaining how poker is one of the best existing microcosms of life. If you’ve played for any period of time you’ve no doubt noticed the analogies between the game and life. You’re dealt a hand that you can’t control, and all you can do is play that hand. You can learn temperance, acceptance of uncontrollable circumstance, and execution in the face of pressure all in a matter of minutes at the poker table. Lessons that could have taken me several lifetimes to learn were doled out to me in unrelenting fashion hour by hour.
I think with more time afforded, and the invaluable skills learned at the poker table, it is a moral imperative that poker players use these means to create some kind of societal impact and potential legacy.
In my opinion I’ve saved the best for last; and that is that poker affords you the control of your own time, an asset far more valuable to me than money. No boss; no schedule. If I want to take a month of to go on vacation, I can. If I want to take two months off to go record an album, I can (and I have). Thus I think with more time afforded, and the invaluable skills learned at the poker table, it is a moral imperative that poker players use these means to create some kind of societal impact and potential legacy. This can be as localized as using that extra time to care for your family. It can be as widespread as innovating the next technological revolution equivalent to the internet. I am not trying to tell you to excise poker from your life. I’m just saying if you use your free time afforded by poker to raise a family or mentor a youth or start an innovative business that gives jobs to people, being a great poker player will pale in comparison to these less “extravagant” achievements.
Be good, y’all (yeah I’m going to start using “y’all” more too); and good luck!