Great Expectations

11 July 2024

By Royal Flushes

CINDY: “It was the best of times. It was the worst of times.” I guess Charles Dickens said this best. You see everything through your eyes of expectations and that has a lot to do with your station in society. Do you have a future? Some people do. Some don’t. In Dickens’ time most people didn’t have much of a future. They had lives of drudgery.

ABBY: This relates to gambling big time. Most of us will lose our money. That is a certainty. So why do we do this? Why do we play games we can’t beat?

CINDY: Do you think most players know they will lose their money? I actually don’t think so. Many do – in a nebulous way. They’ll say things like, “The casinos beat us all!” But do they actually understand how the casinos do that? If they do why do they go to casinos at all?

ABBY: I think players have great expectations when they go to the casinos. Despite knowing or sensing the truth, their hopes overshadow whatever knowledge of the games that they have. Otherwise, why go? Your expectation is to lose. Ultimately to lose whatever money you bring to play with.

CINDY: Okay, we go, right?

ABBY: Happily!

CINDY: Yes, happily. We know the truth of the games, right?

ABBY: Right.

CINDY: And?

ABBY: We play them anyway.

CINDY: Why?

ABBY: We expect the best of times to come our way. Nothing more than that I guess.

CINDY: So, another quote comes our way. Hope springs eternal.

ABBY: I think the casinos charge you up, despite your knowledge. You expect the best of times but you often get the worst of times. Now, those who don’t know how the casinos get their edge over the players must think it is some kind of magic that the casinos have.

CINDY: Players play against the house edge but it doesn’t seem so overwhelming and it certainly doesn’t seem like real magic does it?

ABBY: Okay, so we bundle up all our wishes in our hearts and then we head for the casinos, wishing and hoping that we win, that we beat Lady Luck, only to be thrown down on many occasions.

CINDY: And we go away dejected because we lost again.

ABBY: And the circle repeats – it might take a while, or it might be soon after, but we get revved up to play again.

CINDY: Okay, I feel it too. The revving up to play again.

ABBY: And we know everything there is to know about what it means to play.

CINDY: “It was the best of times. It was the worst of times.” And we go back again and again and now we even write about it. Go figure that one.

ABBY: The excitement could be it. But in a bad streak that excitement can fade quickly.

CINDY: So, we now have an unsolvable problem.

ABBY: And what is that? Why do we play?

CINDY: Beats me!