I was planning on writing a different entry tonight but now I want to write about how I just tripled my money in a cash game of poker and now I am really really really really really really happy. So instead I'm going to write about how awesome poker is.. or more specifically how awesome winning at poker is.
Winning at poker feels so good that it makes you feel high for at least 24 hours if not more. I would say the only good feeling that lasts longer is having an obsessive crush on someone, but that always ends badly. The feeling of winning at poker never goes sour. Even if you lose the next time you play (we'll get to that later), that's a totally different game and you can compartmentalize it in a completely separate place from your winning at poker feeling, which you can bottle up and make last forever.
Because you only have to win one time at poker to have that feeling can last you through several bad games. You can always justify losing, and chalk up winning to your skills and cunning. Of course for most people that's not true. Luck has a lot to do with it. The very best poker players are so skilled that they barely need to rely on luck at all, but for everyone in the tier of poker I play in (which is most poker players), well most of us are just about the same.. some a little better than others, but anyone can win a poker game just as easily as we can all lose one.
But winning feels so good that you completely forget about the mistakes you made and focus on how well you played those few hands that earned you $40 (not exactly high stakes poker). That high can carry you through all of the shitty hands you played when you were getting frustrated and went all in with a pair of 7s just to scare someone off who then they took all your money because they had three queens and it was obvious to everyone but you.
And when you lose at poker... well it feels rather humiliating. It is a pride-killing blow, especially if you are under the impression that you are a great poker player and not, like the rest of us, merely lucky every once in a while.
Whenever I lose at poker I replay each of the mistakes I made, particularly the last one, and try to justify my actions. The process starts with "No, that was a really smart play. The odds were in your favor. You had to call, you had him beat until the end. It was just luck you should have won that hand" and then turns into "you would have spent that $20 on drinks if you hadn't played poker. You'll just not buy groceries tomorrow to make up for it, you can live on rice for a few days can't you?"
And what makes the difference between those two feelings is usually something so small. Your entire disposition can be drastically altered by just these one or two cards.
Tonight that card was a 9. I was up by ten dollars in what we had determined was the second-to-last hand. I got pocket Jacks and then the flop showed three cards lower than mine, 10, 8, 7. I was betting against one of my friends and it was quickly escalating. Another 8 came out on the turn. I thought I had it in the bag. There was no way he had a third 8 with all that betting. I went all in.
And then he called. At this point I was shaking uncontrollably because that is what I do when I bet money (even if I think I'm going to win a hand). Evolution failed me with that trait.
My friend flipped his cards. Pocket Queens.
The difference between going home with nothing and going home with triple the money I started with rested on one card. I could only win if I flipped a Jack (trip Jacks) or a 9 (straight). My friend flipped the next card, and there was the 9.
Unless you are also a poker addict I'm not sure I can describe how good you feel when that happens. It's like a mixture of relief, shock and unbelievable exuberance. I've never done heroine or cocaine or extacy, but I can't imagine how any of them can make you feel as good as it felt to see that 9 flip.
And I was playing well before that. I had stayed in and slowly accumulated cash and I would have been fine going home with what I had before I got those pocket Jacks. And if I had lost all my money I would have stared off into space the entire ride home, trying to tell myself that it was not a stupid call - I made the right decision and I could not have known he had pocket Queens; I am a good poker player and I will win money next time... and none of it would have made me feel better.
And the probability of that card coming up was SO unbelievably slim.
But it did.. I didn't lose. I won. And I am so fucking happy.
Even if it was just because of a little luck.
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