Why Do I Play Poker?

“Man, you should play online. If you don’t play like a dick, you can win some cash. I turned $50 into $1500.” This is my uncle talk­ing. He’s a retired hippy from the 60s. Now he’s a tat­tooed poker player who tells every­one at the casino that his nephew, that’s me, likes to pack fudge. If I hear him say this, my retort is that I only do it with him when he begs for it. But I digress. I took his advice about online poker and haven’t looked back since.

He was kinda right. I turned $50 into $600 in losses. Then I made some changes to my game and now I am a win­ning (only by a bit!) online poker player. Here’s how it went down.

I put $50 into a Full Tilt account and played $1 sit n gos. They were ridicu­lous because no one cared about the money. So I decided to go big, to the tables where my bets would be respected. That’s right, the $5 sit n gos. I have to admit, even at those low stakes my heart would pump like mad. I play for higher stakes in live games, but this just felt different.

It’s so easy to press the all in but­ton. If you win, you can jump up and down and cel­e­brate. If you lose, you can curse the screen and throw your mouse across the room. Bet­ter than that, there is no walk of shame. No awk­ward moments when you avoid eye con­tact with the play­ers after a mis­er­able defeat. No insin­cere, “nice hand”. You can click your­self off that table with those fuck­ers and click right into another game.

Need­less to say the $50 went fast. But I was really get­ting off. Peo­ple say online poker is rigged. Some­times the beats are so unreal, I want to place the blame on some­thing out of my con­trol. Shit, it couldn’t my sucky play! More often than not, I made some fun­da­men­tal error that put me in a bad spot. I know this because I am a big fan of the replay hand but­ton. Watch­ing me be a don­key, over and over again, as I replay hands hurts me ego in a big way, but it sure doesn’t hurt my game.

I play poker because I love learn­ing and study­ing. Other than my fam­ily, noth­ing teaches me more about myself than poker. It forces me to stare in the mir­ror and ask, “Who’s the bitch now?”

Why do you play? Let me know at stories@whydoiplaypoker.net