Feeling Low?

27 October 2024

By Royal Flushes

CINDY: Okay, I have a puzzle for you.

ABBY: I’m not that good at puzzles, you know that. Chances are I will fall flat on my face.

CINDY: Not that kind of puzzle. Really just a matter of your opinion for me to see where you stand.

ABBY: Okay, do it. Ask me your question.

CINDY: If a person is feeling low, maybe a little down in the dumps, depressed, not overwhelmingly mind you but enough that “today is not a good day” type of feelings. Should that person go to the casinos to refresh him or herself? Would casino playing be good for that player?

ABBY: Now that is a puzzle. I don’t think there is one flat answer but I think it leans away from going to the casino.

CINDY: Okay, explain.

ABBY: All right. The odds of winning on any given session in the casino tend to be against you, right?

CINDY: Okay, right.

ABBY: So, you are down in the dumps and you want to perk yourself up by playing some casino games.

CINDY: Yes, true, but there is going out to eat, that type of thing too.

ABBY: True but does that really come to mind as a way to schlugg off the blues? I’m feeling depressed, even just a little, is that meal enough to make you feel good? I don’t think it is in the scheme of things.

CINDY: Playing a game; you know, blackjack or craps or roulette or something?

ABBY: The percentages are against you in all games. Would losing in the casinos fix you feeling bad? I don’t know.

CINDY: I don’t know either.

ABBY: I like to go to the casinos when I am feeling good; when everything is okay with the world. The casino is not my way to escape my life but to enhance my life. The winning and losing just becomes part of the game, part of the experience. It isn’t the thing I need to feel good.

CINDY: I get that. The outcome can be negative for a casino trip but that isn’t the determining factor in how you feel or no one would ever go back to the casino if negative was the only feeling that casino experience gave them. I don’t think that would be a good thing. You are going to experience losses, more losses probably than wins, is that the determining factor? I don’t think so. The casino experience is a total package.

ABBY: The casino can’t be the place where you want to go to solve difficult situations in your real life. That would not be the way to handle the experience of living. You would, if you lose and have a rotten trip, feel much worse. Now what? Where do you go to get rid of that? More gambling would definitely not be the cure for that.

CINDY: I don’t disagree with you. Casinos should be a pleasant interlude in life, not a desperate situation attempting to solve real world problems. I think you’d be looking for trouble.

ABBY: You can be happy about winning, sad about losing but you had a good meal, some good conversations, and the overall casino experience was fun, no matter the results of the games you played. Maybe you saw a good show too. Great. But none of that can get you out of your real-world funk. Real life and casino life should not be the real world to you as if you can combine them and everything will be good. Life doesn’t happen that way.

CINDY: Well, you answered my puzzle, didn’t you?

ABBY: I did, didn’t I?

CINDY: Yes.