On the Importance of Paying Attention

On the Importance of Paying Attention

I take notes at the poker table. Some people consider it rude I guess. You tell me. I'm sitting there playing hold'em, with a pen in one pocket and a piece of paper in the other, and a thought on my mind that I will certainly forget unless it is immediately recorded on a 3x5 card that will remain in my pocket all the way home, where it will find its way into a pile of other barely-used 3x5 cards that will all get tucked away somewhere when company is coming over, only to be unearthed by me years later, at which time I will look at each card until I come upon the grand words written so long ago, words important enough to risk irking my beloved poker opponents by writing them down:

Buy eggs.

Okay, maybe it’s a little rude. Or maybe just a little weird. Grabbing little cards out of my pocket and jotting things down while you are right in the middle of a poker hand. And I know that people sometimes wonder if I’m writing things like, “Moe raised with A9 and Joe reraised with J9 and Curly flashed his AJ to me before folding it. The flop came A-J-9, with blanks on the turn and river, and Curly mumbled something about an idiot, and a moron, and I wondered. Was he talking about Moe and Joe? Or himself? Hard to be sure, here at the poker table, the eternal landscape where uncertainty is principal . . . and c’mon now, would that even fit on a 3x5 card?

My notes are nothing more than insurance protection against my memory. Reminders and such. And captured bits of association, such as, I’ll notice that it’s getting dark at 5:30 and that means December so I’ll make a note to buy a Three Stooges video for Christmas for my nephew. Because it’s dark outside. Yeah, I know. Hard to follow. That’s why I have to right it down.

And besides, doesn’t being a writer give me license to be a bit odd? Tilted in a harmless way, like Pluto’s orbit? One of my weird routines is to work on a work-in-progress no matter what else is in progress. But I do try to be polite about it. Like in line at the bank. I won’t use the back of the person in front of me as a writing surface. Or if I’m playing hold’em, I won’t sprawl full-size sheets of paper all over the table, and I’ll wait until the shuffle to ask the dealer for editorial help. With courtesy in mind, I revise with the papers in my lap, with one eye on the game, so as not to slow things down when it is my turn to fold. And I try not to get any red ink on the cards. But sometimes, like this one time, it didn’t go so smoothly.

I was happily cocooned with my cap on and head down, revising away, and I hardly noticed the new player who sat down to my right and posted three chips to get a hand. His chips registered in my brain as a big blind, which would make me first to act, so I glanced at my cards and I folded - woops - out of turn. My fold caused a chain reaction of out-of-turn action behind me. I apologized, but I kept on revising. A few hands later it was my big blind. No one raised. The action came quickly around to me. Too quickly. I was smack in the middle of writing something down. The dealer gave me the standard verbal nudge: “option.” I was so unready. Everyone had to wait while I freed my hands from pen and paper, while I looked at my cards, and while finally, as expected, I checked.

This guy I'd never met before got miffed at me. He said, “What the hell are you doing over there under the table that’s so important?”

One of my buddies spoke up to defend me. “Don’t mind Tommy. He’s the village idiot. Plus he writes poker articles, which is probably what he's doing right now.”

The miffed man got even more so. He glared at me. “Oh really?” You write poker articles? Like you know something we don’t know or something? Okay. Mr. Wiseguy. What great lesson are you writing about right now?”

I replied, “It’s an article on the importance of paying attention.”