Twenty plus years as a school counselor may have prepared me for my Grandma Moses "career", my favorite pasttime which is playing cards. As preposterous as that may sound, there is truth to it because most of what happens at a poker table involves awareness and identification of personalities and predicting and evaluating their behaviors. The settings are drastically different, or are they? Sitting around a poker table with strangers or friends is an immense bonding experience. It is a microcosm of life and the many personalities in the world.
It was my job to observe and evaluate children and teens. Conclusions had to be drawn about their personality types, leadership styles, potentials, right-brain/left-brain dominance, intelligence, daring, at-risk behaviors, flexibility, persistence, determination, and more. While sitting at a card table with 9 other adults, I see certain characters coming to life. Sometimes it takes longer than others for
"them" to appear but if you sit there for an hour or so, they will come.
It is good to have had guidance sessions with class clowns, jocks, computer whiz, mama's boy, prom queens, "most likely to land in prison" guys, baby of the family, band boys....and all of the others we have all known in our school days.
Ordinarily I don't reveal what career field I was in, but once in a game at Wynn, an obnoxious, talkative, aggressive young man was getting on the last nerve of everyone at our table. He had not said much directly to me, but when I won a big hand from him, he started mouthing to me.
After a few barbs, I told him that I knew who he was. He quickly blasted that we had never met before. My reply not only relieved the tension at the table, but obviously struck a nerve with Loud Mouth.
I just smiled and said, "Oh, I'm sorry. I was a school counselor once, and I recognized you as the kid who always got sent to the office because the teachers' wanted you out of their classrooms."
He looked embarrassed and grinned for the first time all day, and said, "That's right...ummm, but you weren't the counselor.
Collusion. Collision?
Often poker is learned by playing at the kitchen table for pennies with family and friends. Everyone has to play to make the game. Uncle Joe and Aunt Sue, Grandma and Grandpa, Mom and Dad are all couples, but that is not the same as today's poker room couple teams.
The difference comes when the stakes change. Playing for matches or pennies at home is far from playing for real money with strangers in a cardroom.
Couple teams can be found wherever poker is being played. The popularity of poker has led more women into cardrooms today. Many go independently and enjoy the status of being single at the table. Others have learned poker because they did not want to be left at home while their husbands go out. Once they start playing, they really get into it and feel a sense of their own ability.
When two people share the same pocketbook and sit at the same table, it is natural that they will try to preserve and expand it. After all, it is costing them more to play than the rest of us.
Not much can be done to discourage husbands and wives from sitting at the same table. Dealers and floor managers cannot anticipate issues before they exist. The grey area of whether the couple is colluding, perhaps unintentionally, could not be proved without an outright violation.
Some couples are quiet and try to hide the fact they are together. Other unexperienced ones are "outed" when the husband glows with pride as he sees his wife call to the river and beat AA with her small straight.
In her book Poker Face, Katy Lederer wrote of the fierce competition among her Lederer family members over games when they were growing up. Howard and his sister Annie Duke are still at it which can be seen on national tv. Yet, Annie cried when she knocked Howard out of a major tournament a few years ago.
Emotions cannot be barred from any sporting or gaming event.
This is no suggestion to ban couples from playing at the same table. But couple teams, with or without a T-shirt advertising their union, may want to be aware how they are perceived by other players.
DADDY'S GIRLSPoker has traditionally been a man's game, so women who love to play have to learn to hold their own. My personal theory is that Daddy's Girls love to play poker because we usually see someone or some behavior at the table that reminds us of that most important man in our early lives. Riding shotgun in my father's pickup truck in Central Texas in the 1950's left a powerful impression on me. It taught me how important it is to balance being feminine while secretly dreaming of being "one of the guys" just like Dad.
At the poker table I can do both, and sometimes to my advantage, as most other women players have.
Is it a surprise that I play and imagine I am Jennifer Harmon riding in the pickup truck with Daddy Doyle?
I have met and played with famous basketball coaches, financial analysts, therapists, writers, as well as tree-trimmers, plumbers, teachers, stay-at-home mothers, and others from many professions.
After attending The Real Deal at The Venetian, Phil Laak, Lacey Jones and Antonio Esfandiari took me and a few other people to Lavo for drinks. It was fun talking to them and listening to their witty exchanges. Recently, at a satellite tournament at Wynn Classic, I looked up to see Hoyt Corkins across the table from me. I never know who I'll meet next.
Poker is a great equalizer because it gives us the opportunity to sit at the same table regardless of what we do or who we are. Most people who play are great readers of others and intelligent in a way that is not easy to explain. We do not bond or connect with everyone we play with, but the ones we do are like adding another person to the family.
Linda Geenen, First Poker Blogger. Read her blog Table Tango.Two famous quotes are Andy Warhol's "Fifteen Minutes of Fame" and Casablanca's "Of all the gin joints in all of the world, she walks into mine."
Today I thought of both of them when I read Linda Geenen's most recent blog post. Linda writes reviews of Las Vegas poker rooms. I was playing with her group of off-duty Bellagio dealers at the Monte Carlo poker room for several hours when she asked me if she could take my picture. Little did I know that she she would include me in a blog with a paragraph and picture of me.
The first quote relates to me in a tongue-in-cheek way. Recognition in a paragraph that takes 35 seconds to read is hardly fame, but it was fun to read her observations at the same poker table.
"Of all the (poker rooms) in all of the world---", I walked into the one where Linda was playing and sat down by her and Marie. What a coincidence. Or was it? Every day we meet people by chance who become a part of our lives.
You can read her entire Table Tango Blog on this subject at the address in the left column. This is an excerpt from it.
"One of the true delights of the evening was Judy. She took the 1s and I knew that I knew her from either playing with or dealing to her at Bellagio. As the game progressed and Marie and her and I visited, I knew she was a ‘keeper’. If she lived in Vegas I’d have her on my ‘Pan Game Plays’ list. Not only did she step right into our circle of poker play and gabbing lifestyle, she knew how to play and had a lot of moxie. She’s also a blogger, although she feels she doesn’t fit into the ‘poker’ blogging mold, she’s a player and adds a nice dimension to all realities, including poker. Of course she hates this picture – but that’s the way most of man/womankind reacts when they are faced with their own image. I think she’s a beauty.On of the true delights of the evening was Judy. She took the 1s and I knew that I knew her from either playing with or dealing to her at Bellagio. As the game progressed and Marie and her and I visited, I knew she was a ‘keeper’. If she lived in Vegas I’d have her on my ‘Pan Game Plays’ list. Not only did she step right into our circle of poker play and gabbing lifestyle, she knew how to play and had a lot of moxie. She’s also a blogger, although she feels she doesn’t fit into the ‘poker’ blogging mold, she’s a player and adds a nice dimension to all realities, including poker. Of course she hates this picture – but that’s the way most of man/womankind reacts when they are faced with their own image. I think she’s a beauty."
http://table-tango.pokerworks.com/blog/2006.09/2007/monte_carlo/judy.jpg
And that is how I make new friends. Thanks, Linda.
DONKEY HO-TEEIn the poker world, there is a commonly used definition of the word "donkey". Poker players know what that is. Not too long ago I experienced a very obvious and outright example of another kind of donkey in the poker room.
First I need to explain that women at the card table have to be like Ginger Rogers dancing with Fred Astaire. We have to do everything the man does, but we have to do it more just to prove we belong there, instead of in the kitchen.
Of the two basic categories of men in a card game, my favorite is The Gentleman. The Gentleman is the same to men and women and has common decency and politeness for everyone. A gentleman may even call another player "donkey" but it is usually in harmless fun. One player I know even keeps a small plastic donkey on the table as he plays. Maybe its his good luck charm, or maybe its just his way of having fun.
Now for some background that leads to Donkey Definition No. 2. I was sitting next to a very nice, charming woman, and over the course of a few hours, we bonded as we played. She was well-dressed and a classy lady who is in her late 60's. It was not unusual that we were the only women at a table full of men. She ended up several times in a heads-up hand with a man I choose to call Boss Hogg. The outcome was in Classy Lady's favor, and it obviously was getting under Boss's skin.
He began to mouthe to the men next to him, and I heard him use the word "broads." This continued for some time. The Lady and I ignored his ongoing derogatory comments. Only one man at the table joined in Boss's crude behavior. He was like a junior high kid seeking approval of the bully by laughing at his mean jokes and rolling his eyes.
When I won a hand that Boss was in, he said quite clearly, "That's what you get when you play with a bunch a broads."
Non-gentleman No. 2 laughed and agreed.
I had had enough."What, Sir, is your definition of a 'broad', I asked?"
Without looking at me, Boss replied, "I wasn't talking to you!"
"Yes, Sir, I understand that. But, you were talking about me, and you have been saying the same thing about my friend. I would like to know if you mean it to be demeaning?"
"Take it however you want." he said.
Then he mumbled like a kid who was caught with his hand in the candy jar, "Its just another word for woman."
You would think this would have stopped the mean-spirited banter from him, but he only escalated. If any man at the table won a hand, Boss and his panting ally started saying, "Chalk one up for the boys!" "Chalk another one for the boys!"
On and on, it went until finally The Gentleman who I have played with many times and who also knows Boss from past experiences spoke up. "OK, (name), that's enough. You are out of line," said my hero.
There was a silence at the table, and Boss snickered. Little Boss did his obligatory snicker as well. Just to prove his manhood, he slightly modified but continued his comments for the course of the next few minutes.
It was time to leave for both of us "broads", so we gladly said goobye, cashed out our huge stack of chips, and called it a day.
I related this story to another Gentleman who has played with Boss for some time and understands him and his mean spirit.
He gave me the most interesting bit of information.
Gentleman No 2. laughed and said, "You know what Boss does for a living, don't you?"
"Of course not," I said.
"Well, he is in the business of raising and selling donkeys."I can truly say there were two donkeys in the poker room stall that day.
