My Greatest Poker Session Ever

So I walked into my "regular" poker room today for the first time in 3 months. I put the word "regular" in quotation marks because I'm not (a) regular in either the general sense of the word nor the proctological sense, both owing to my recent back surgery. Too much information, sorry, I know.


Anyway, a group of people come up to say hello and tell me how well I look. A lie, of course, but a nice one, a distant cousin to the lie a sometime poster here told me when he asked for my mailing address to send me a get-well card and instead sent me two wonderful CDs. Some lies are OK, some are wonderful.


Half of them told me it was great to see me alive and well; the other half said nothing, and I assume they disagreed with both the alive and well part, proving the old adage that you can only please half of the people half of the time (for a net of 25%?), or however that goes.


As sitting is still a literal and figurative pain in the ass, I played for only an hour and a half. One minor mistake, one major one, a couple of good plays. About par for the course.


At this point in the story, I was going to lie and tell you I lost two racks and it was the greatest poker session of my life. Alas, I won half a rack, but had I lost those two racks, it still would have been my greatest poker session ever. I hope one day to shoot 115 on the golf course and get schmottered in a tennis match 6-0, 6-0. Those will be my greatest golf and tennis games ever too.


When you don't know whether or not you'll ever walk again, much less walk into a casino or onto a golf course or tennis court, being able to do something you love is a treasure (and of course it should always be so). For all my past complaints about the jerks you encounter in the card room, and the lousy service, and this and that, the fact remains I love poker. I guess we all do and that's why we're here. I don't quite know why--the thrill of victory, the naughtiness of it, the boyishness of it, the comraderie, the rush of gambling--probably a combination of all of those things and more. I know Mr. Sklansky says that to think of poker as something glamorous is very bad. And of course, logically, he's right. But these days I'll let logic take a back seat, at least temporarily. More like Nick the Greek's philosophy--the next best thing to gambling and winning is gambling and losing. Needless to say, do not try this at home.


The moral of the story? Well, please no sympathy responses. There are so many people I know who've had a harder time than I have and are much, much more deserving of your sympathy. But:


1) If you're young, listen to us old farts who tell you to take care of yourself.


2) If you're young, listen to us old farts who tell you it goes by pretty damn fast. One morning you wake up and look into the mirror and there's an old man looking back at you. Carpe diem!


3) No matter what your age, enjoy life! Bad beats happen, make the best of them, not the worst. A Morganesque approach, seasoned with Angeloic understanding, seems just about right.


Andy

Andy:


Good to hear you're back in action. Keep us posted on your progress and best of luck at the tables.


Best wishes,

Mason

Nice post Andy.....


I know exactly how you feel....a multiple of lower back problems has pretty much incapacitated me for the past 6 months or so....


Hell, I'm only a 90 minute drive from Foxwoods and I've only made it 5 or 6 times in that period because (as I'm sure you've experienced), when you don't know whether your going to be able to walk 1/4 of a mile, it kind of limits your options.


As far as the "old farts" stuff?


lol.....when one is physically active and in decent shape, one can NEVER imagine the impact of being semi-incapacitated.


It's the little "stuff" that gets you.....like walking out to get the morning newspapers, and being barely able to make it back to sit down and read them!


So, I "second" your old farts advice about taking care of yourself.


I would also add (based upon my own experiences) that once your body starts breaking down, it's a real bitch to get it back in shape.


Hope things are on the upswing for you......


Carpe Diem!!!

Here is the idea:


http://www.juliansimon.org/writings/.../chapte01.html


Frankly, I don't go in for this stuff. I believe that if you win the lottery - which was your goal - you should be happy for the rest of your life. And if you fail to win the WSOP - which was your goal - you should be unhappy for the rest of your life.


I think setting high expectations, and being constantly disappointed with reality, is the proper way to live life. I can't say whether I've ever been content with myself or anything, and the very idea of contentment frightens me.


I think your benchmark state should be set unrealistically high at all times.


eLROY

Thoughtful post, eLROY, for which I thank you.


My thinking is that while one should set one's goals for the moon, goals should be reassessed in light of changed circumstances. I would think if I was constantly disappointed with reality and frightened of contentment, it wouldn't be a very happy existence.


I've had poker session where I felt extremely disappointed when I won $2,000. I wouldn't have been disappointed had I lost $2,000 yesterday. Different benchmarks for different times of life and different circumstances.

elroy,


while i agree with you that contentment is the #1 contributor to slothful, lazy, lethargic living, it seems like there is another option for us. that is to set our goals high, aim for the best, and then to assess our actual performance and judge how well we did. and then be happy with it. in spite of not always hitting the moon, we can still be happy when our health is good, and our kids are healthy, and our girlfriends are still with us, and we can still buy chips at the poker room. i for one am grateful for every breath i take. (these days its mostly due to a girl i know who i have taken quite a liking for, and she for me.) idealism undergirded by realism, it could be called, perhaps...

she IS the moon... and the sun and the stars, and most of the planets as well, as far as im concerned. but perhaps you could elaborate on what you mean?