STORY PAGE
The Card Games
I am not a great card player, but I am very good. Very good can be relative.
I had played penny-ante with the grownups before I was 10 and pinochle before I was 8. Before joining the Coast Guard I had a few loosing nights, but all in all, I was a fairly consistent winner.
Aboard ship I played cards frequently. We were at sea almost every other month. Even with eight hours of watch every day, drills on weekdays, inspections, and the necessities of eating, sleeping, personal hygiene, etc. there was an abundance of free time. Cards were the choice of many. Of all the times I played, I remember three instances in particular.
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One evening when I could not find a poker, pinochle, spades, or hearts game, I chose to play what in my mind was the one game I feel takes between little and no card sense. Blackjack. It was the first and only time I played aboard ship.
I started with less than two dollars. By the time I was ready for my mid-watch, the other players who remained in the game talked me into paying some one to take my watch. They wanted a chance to regain their money. Before sunrise, I had accumulated more cash and IOU's, than I made in paychecks for that entire year.
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It was games such as that above that eventually led the Captain to take action while at sea. Everything a person needed could be charged at the ship's exchange, so payroll would not be issued until just before we returned to port. This did stop the money games. Most would not play for IOU’s, as some would not honor their IOU. (The above card game taught me that)
Without money some of us played for cigarettes. At only a dollar a carton and being chargeable at the ships exchange it was a great way of keeping score. Since I had finally quit smoking, my winnings would go to friends and family.
Without thinking one night I "lit up" one of those cigarettes and continued smoking for the next14 years. That card game cost me a fortune.
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In 1962 I spent over two months in the Marine Hospital on Staten Island. While doctors were trying to find out why I had such a high white count, I managed to find many card games. I also learned another, cribbage. I was doing very well in the "card" department again. One night one of the other players said, "You're pretty good. You belong upstairs with the Merchies." He then explained that a group of elderly Merchant Mariners played high states knock rummy. They were mostly oriental and "old as the hills".
I located their game and asked if I could sit in. They explained that their game was for experts, and would be considered "high stakes" for an enlisted man. I told them I loved knock rummy; it was thinking mans game, and I was very good at it. They let me join.
That first night didn't go so well. Nobody could win without some luck, and I had none. Within a few hours, I lost all of the money I had accumulated playing the previous few weeks.
A few weeks later I had compiled a new stash and was ready to take on the "experts" once again. When I joined the game I was asked how much cash I had brought. I told them. One suggested a side bet. The bet was that if he could convince me to leave before the first game was over, I would give him $100.00. If not, he would give me a give me an additional $100.00 to play with if I lost what I had.
I took the bet, how could I loose.
He did not play the first game but stayed behind me. Including me there were five players. Better than half way through the game he asked everyone to stop playing. He looked at me and explained that the player I discarded to would win if I discarded the card I was planning. He then named every card of that player’s hand but one. (My discard would have put him out). He then named each of the other player’s hands. Again correct within one card each.
He then explained that they were all defensive players. They were equally as competent, and it was the luck of the draw that determined the out come of their games. When I played in their game the person I discarded to would always be the big winner. If I gave him the hundred now, I would leave with the remainder of my cash and not effect their playing. If I stayed, I would loose it all.
I gave him the $100.00 and said thank you. (They split the Hundred and I returned to easier opponents.)
Like I said, "Being very good is only relative."
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