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Fear & loathing in a game of cards
(Note: I use the word "dummy" in the sense it is used in bridge exactly twice in the writing which follows; those uses should be clear from context. All other uses of the word are in its everyday meaning.)
Dummy's Dilemma 1: How do you talk about something you know relatively little about?
Dummy's Dilemma 2: How do you make incompetence entertaining?
I live in an Institution where, among all the other activities they offer, there is bridge played Friday afternoons. Several volunteers who know the game, including the bridge expert Carl, come in to manually help residents who cannot use their hands, and to dispense advice on how to play the game better.
Carl earns his living teaching bridge, and I am convinced that he is a savant in the game. He can, for example, give the barest glance at the hands of the four players and instantly commit them all to memory (at times to be used later to demonstrate some intricacy of play to another gathering.) Then too, he can look at each hand and tell its holder what the best bid should be. And finally, he can guide the person playing the hand through the labyrinth of tricks in order to make (usually) their contract.
Of course, Carl is not totally infallible; but that is due to certain extreme cases which can arise as part of the game and that are not his fault. (That is, Carl plays the odds.)
I learned to play bridge in our family while I was growing up. Now Bridge players are notoriously temperamental: the verbal browbeatings of partners because of perceived wrong bids or crossed signals have been known to wreak havoc on friendships and to end marriages. Our family was no exception. Luckily for me and my brother, the histrionics had occurred before we were born; so by the time we were playing, our mother had already worked it out that she would never again be my father's partner. So, since my brother shared my father's temperament, he was our father's partner any time we played; while the two reticent ones -- my mother and I -- enjoyed a peaceful and harmonious relationship as partners.
As can be surmised from the above, my father and brother had a passion for the game of bridge which my mother and I lacked. They wanted desperately to win, and they knew that there was always room to improve their skills. By contrast, my mother and I just enjoyed playing the game at whatever skill level we were at, and we didn't particularly care whether we won or lost. That is, we willingly and deliberately relinquished the urge to improve our playing.
That latter may be desirable in order to preserve family peace, but it is not a good attitude to have when one finds oneself thrust into a bridge environment in which experts watch and analyze one's every move under a magnifying glass.
I found myself so thrust.
Now the question might arise as to why, with my limited sensibilities, I put myself into an adverse bridge environment in the first place. The answer is twofold: first, I've become addicted to Carl's sardonic wit and banter (some of which I don't understand, but that's part of the charm); and second, because I have played a good many of the card games known to man, and I've found that by far the most intriguing and challenging one is bridge.
Unfortunately, I was not up to the challenge. And the reason is due to a few (yes, let's be blunt) little or not-so-little psychopathologies I happen to have brought with me courtesy of my upbringing. These pathologies extend to every nook and cranny of the game, even the most trivial things that may not seem to hold horrors but that nevertheless trigger my paranoia. I discuss some of these below.
1. The shuffle:
How much should the dealer shuffle the cards in bridge? This is one of the questions about which I obsess while I am playing.
Everyone seems to assume that the cards should be shuffled at least a little bit. But why? Because otherwise they are not sufficiently random. But what is 'sufficiently' random? Unshuffled, the deck of cards would consist of the thirteen tricks from the previous round. In general, each of those tricks contains cards of the same suit; the next deal will distribute these equally amongst the four players. Thus, each player will receive about the same number of cards in each suit.
But I do not want the same number of cards in a given suit as my opponent. I want more -- a lot more! So instinctively I protest against this wretched egalitarianism. Thus do I say: shuffle the cards!
But how much should they be shuffled? Assumedly, each shuffle brings the order of cards closer to total randomness. And the thought of that for me is like gazing into the abyss or being sucked into the maelstrom! It is the prospect of total entropy, of utter disorder. Do you know how many possible hands there are in bridge? About 635 billion (give or take a few million.) Inwardly I cringe at the very thought of such a number.
Best, then, to shuffle, but not too much. How much is "not too much"? I myself know it is enough when I feel myself beginning to get nervous as I sense chaos looming.
2. The deal:
We residents of the Institution cannot deal the cards ourselves. So Carl and the other volunteers do it for us. They assume that one of us is the dealer, and that rotates around the table from hand to hand.
How does a dealer deal the cards? Normally he begins with the person to his left and goes clockwise around the table. In that way, he (the dealer) is the last person to receive a card.
But that's not the way Carl deals. He gives the first card to the dealer and moves around the table clockwise. Thus the last person to receive a card is to the dealer's right.
Well! This means that I have gotten the hand that rightfully belongs to the person to my left. And thus, in a sense, I am looking at what I shouldn't be looking at. This gives me a secret thrill at beholding the illicit, the forbidden. I gaze covertly over at my opponent to see whether she is aware of this violation of a part of her: is she regarding me with envy or mistrust? (Apparently with neither, for she is not looking my way at all.) I feel the smug satisfaction of the voyeur -- the one who has access to another's confidential information.
But then I realize with chagrin that this cuts both ways. For the person to my right has the hand that is rightfully mine. Resentment begins to build in me; I feel violated at this intrusion. In my rage I consider the possibility of taking a couple of sneak peeks over at my neighbor's hand. After all, it is really mine!
Fortunately, rationality (a rare thing for me during bridge!) rescues me. For (so I reason) if I have the right to do that, then my opponent to my left has the selfsame right to look at my hand. And so on, around the table. In this way each player would know the contents of two hands: their own, and the one of the opponent on their right. Then (I further reason) the bidding might proceed with the purpose of each player attempting to uncover the contents of the other two hands. This could be done using some kind of arcane artificial bidding system of the sort that bridge players love. And the first player to uncover the contents of all the hands could yell something like "bingo!" and be declared the winner of that round.
I wonder what the other players would think of this reasonable idea?
3. The bidding:
The thirteen cards that each player receives are separated by suit and each suit arranged in descending order on two wooden cardholders in front of each of us. Each player counts up his/her points (Ace = 4, King = 3, etc.): a rough guideline is that one can bid with at least thirteen points. And this is where my paranoia begins in earnest.
Let me say something right up front here. I realize that, for the bridge fanatic, bidding constitutes one of the major joys of the game [the other one is playing a hand.] Indeed, the process of bidding, as a sequence of exchanging oblique verbal cues with one's partner in order to find the best contract to be in, can be a beautiful and subtle process. Unfortunately, I cannot draw that kind of aesthetic pleasure from bidding because hanging over my neck like an executioner's sword is the dreaded possibility that I might actually get the bid and then be 'forced' to play the hand.
And so (to wax religious for a moment) I pray that this cup, in one way or another, might pass from my lips.
My first impulse is to hope that I should have such a lousy hand (few if any points) as to prevent me from bidding in the first place. In that way I would be relieved of the burden of worry at the very onset that I might have to play the hand. If my prayers are answered, then I shall pass when my turn comes to bid. Over the course of my time here I have developed a number of nifty personas to deal with that eventuality:
- the world-weary persona: "Ah me, I suppose I shall have to pass."
- the debonair persona: "Oh I think I'll just pass."
- the guilt-ridden persona: "I'm so sorry partner, but I'm afraid I need to pass!"
- the angry persona: "Dammit, I have to pass again!"
- the blunt persona: "Pass."
... and so on, until even I get bored with those sorry excuses for play-acting. At that point I begin to yearn for more; for eventually in bridge, even for me, boredom trumps paranoia -- at least for a while.
So in that bored state I begin to hope for more. In fact, I want the biggest, the fattest cards in the deck! I want so many big fat cards that I will be able to bid a 'slam' (that is, betting that I will take virtually all the tricks if I play the hand) with insolent nonchalance.
Of course, with that sort of sudden hubris I would have temporarily forgotten that a contract of a slam in bridge is that most rare of entities; and so its playing would become a situation of the utmost pressure on me to succeed where there is virtually no room to fail. Fortunately, the chances of getting such a hand are around one in a few billion (give or take -- whatever) so probability saves me from my own worst instincts. (In general, beware of what you wish for: you may get your wish.)
Eventually, no thanks to the perniciousness of probability, I will get a hand that's at least good enough to 'demand' that I bid. Nevertheless, I continue to pray for the metaphorical cup to pass from my proverbial lips, as follows: I wish that my partner will bid my strong suit first, so that my bid is merely supportive of hers. In this way she will have to play both her hand and mine, while I sit back and contentedly watch as the 'dummy' -- that is, the one person who literally does nothing during the playing of the hand.
4. The playing:
I see bridge as a series of coercions against me the helpless victim. I am 'forced' to bid if I have at least 13 points. I 'must' answer if my partner makes a bid and I have at least six points. And, if I do get the bid, I 'have' to play the hand.
Regardless of my most strenuous efforts to avoid it, eventually the situation comes about that I 'have' to play a hand.
In that case, faced with having to 'perform' before The Bridge Virtuoso, I allow myself to go all squishy inside. I become fresh putty, moist clay which invites Carl to mold me as he pleases. In other words (to beat a metaphor to death), I am utterly malleable in his hands.
However, outwardly I give as little hint of this inner Play-Doh character as possible. I adopt the persona of the serious tournament bridge player. In this guise, I am not so much asking Carl for help as consulting with him, as one expert to another, on the best strategy. So I might, with a look of great consternation on my face, say something like "So Carl, what's your opinion on how best to proceed?" -- as if I were General Montgomery talking to General Eisenhower about the invasion of Europe. The good thing is, Carl is perfectly willing to take this thing and run with it; all I have to do is appear as if I am pulling the strings.
And so, for example, I would 'guide' him as to the 'best' card in my hand to 'choose' on a given play -- even though in many such cases, only one card makes sense in the context. But I would still nod my head at the card as if it was the most significant thing in the world, and say in the heavy learned tone of the bridge sage: "the 3".
Rather than describe in intricate horror 'my' playing of a hand, I have assembled a collection of typical 'Carl-isms' and my mystified reactions to them below.
Carl (after I say 'pass' on a really crummy hand with few points): "Oh no -- you can't pass with a hand like that! That would be a crime! You've gotta bid! You should bid [names some astronomical number with a suit] at the very least!"
[I 'gotta' bid? Here we go again -- coercion! I am now convinced that this man is a sadist whose one goal in life is to torture me. And even if he does play the hand successfully and make the contract (which he will 99% of the time), he's still a sadist!
[it's a 'crime' not to bid? So call me a criminal!]
Carl (as we are bidding): "Oh no, you can't pass now -- you need to go to game!" (Note: 'game' is a relatively high bid; but if you make it, you get a lot of extra points. Of course, we are not keeping track of points in our games here; so I have to assume that this useless affectation is just another way for Carl to torture us.)
[But what if I'm not game to go to game?]
Carl (as soon as the 'dummy' lays down his cards): "Now count how many tricks you can take."
[He is sounding an awful lot like my pimp!]
Carl: "Lead this card -- it's always the right choice."
The card is played, and it is immediately trumped.
Carl (who had canary feathers around his mouth even before the card was trumped): "... but not this time." When I ask him about it, he humorously shrugs, "It was still the right choice!"
[How can something be "always right" and wrong at the same time? Is there some kind of higher-order dialectic that I'm missing here? Or are we in some kind of Orwellian situation where 'Wrong is Right'?]
Carl: "Now you can draw the trump."
[Why couldn't I draw the trump before? Was there a penalty for early withdrawal?]
Carl: "No -- that's the last suit you want to play at this stage. That can never be the right play."
[Needless to say, I could not see any difference in terms of which suit to play: each one seemed equally hopeful -- or hopeless -- compared to any other. And is he sure that it can never be the right play? Not even 17 Fridays from now?]
Carl: "Why don't you try this card; maybe you can develop some tricks in that suit."
[What does he mean by 'develop'? Is this sort of like building a housing tract? What is the difference between 'developing' a trick and simply taking one? How do you know when you're done 'developing' and you can start 'taking'?]
Carl: "We use the Stamen Convention for bidding."
[As opposed to what -- the Pistol Convention?]
... and so forth.
When I was teaching mathematics, I found that my students fell into various learning categories. At the very top were those who were self-starters: these needed very little if any instruction from me. At the next several levels down were those who were capable of learning provided that, in various degrees, I held their hands and coddled them.
And then there were those students at the very bottom: those were the ones, despite all my efforts, who could not learn the subject matter. I called those students "blank slates on which one cannot write."
This is an apt description of my situation in bridge.
We are all aware of the set of books under the generic title, "[Whatever subject] For Dummies" (there is even one called "Sex For Dummies".) One day I asked Carl whether there was a "Bridge for Dummies" book in the series. He said that there was. I inquired as to how it was.
Carl: "Terrible. Awful. Execrable. It is a model of obfuscation. It's the worst introduction to bridge that I've ever seen -- and that's saying something!"
How appropriate -- a dummy looking for a book for dummies which turns out to have been written by dummies.
(16 July 2008)
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