THE PRICE OF DESIGNER SHOES
July 2, 2003
Monday I gambled away five hundred dollars at the Pechanga Indian Resort Casino.
It was fun.
I played poker machines then switched to a little Blackjack. I was up for a while and then I lost. And then I went to the cash machine again and again and again. On the way to the cash machine a fourth time I actually saw an Indian. A tall proud-looking man with a long braid down his back. That made me feel good. I think he worked there as a janitor or some kind of maintenance guy. I rationalized my losses by thinking that I had paid his salary for the week. I proceeded to the cash machine thinking about how he deserved a raise and that my continuing to gamble would help provide it.
I don’t gamble often. Maybe once a year or so. The last time we went to Palm Springs we went to the Indian Casino there. I lost then too. That was about a month ago. So it’s been two times I’ve gambled this year. Oh, then there was the time before that, that we went to Pechanga. I think that was about three months ago. But really, we don’t go that often. We don’t.
Gambling is something I’ve never been able to control. I’ll play till the last dollar is gone and then apologize to the valet for not having money to tip. Maybe I love it so much because I come from a family of gamblers. As long as I can remember my parents would play poker with my aunts and uncles every Friday night. It became the highlight of my week. They’d come over with their kids and while they gambled, we kids would have fun. You know, the good kind of fun like before there were video games and VCR’s and computers. We’d have water drinking contests, give each other Indian burns and tell spooky stories. Then there were the board games; Scrabble, Monopoly, Risk, Bingo. We stay up late till we hit the silly hour when you get giddy and laugh at anything, a burp, a fart, a booger joke. We’d laugh till we peed our pants and then we’d fall asleep, exhausted.
My father’s family lived in Michigan. Every summer we’d drive across the country to visit them but the first stop of the trip was always Reno. My mother would buy my sister and me some hamburgers and comic books and leave us in the Greyhound bus station while she and my father went off to gamble. It wasn’t as dangerous as it sounds. It was safer back then, I guess, to leave a six year old alone in a bus station. Anyway, we’d sit on orange plastic furniture and eat our bus station burgers. And while my sister read ‘Betty and Veronica,’ I’d wander off to watch cowboys play the slot machines in the bus station lobby.
Once I made friends with one of the cowboys. He was tall, of course, to a six year old, everybody was tall. But at the treetop top of this beanpole of a man was a huge white cowboy hat that he had tilted back on his head to leave breathing room for his large hooked nose. He smiled a lot and paid attention to me, so I stuck around. He was playing a silver dollar machine and I stood next to him and watched, reciting Hail Mary’s to help him win. It was a huge shiny machine with three windows with rotating pictures of a bell, cherries, a plum and an orange. Then there was this black bar that said Jackpot. You wanted to get three of those. On the side of the machine was a long silver handle with a black knob at the top. The cowboy would give that knob a white knuckle grab and pull it down, like he was yanking the horns of a runaway bull. Gears would grind and click, click, click, the fruit would appear in the window and if I prayed hard enough, silver dollars would come clanking out an opening in the bottom and fall into a metal tray. And every time he won, the cowboy would look down at me grin this wide toothy smile and tell me to keep on praying, it was working. I’d pray even harder wishing I had brought my rosary beads with me for that extra prayer power boost. Me and the cowboy were partners. Bells were ringing, coins were clanging. God, I wanted to reach up and pull that handle then stick my hand out and feel the weight of those cold silver dollars as they tumbled down into it.
When my mother came back to check on us, she yanked me away from my cowboy. She didn’t even let me keep the silver dollar he gave me as thanks for all my prayers. I resented my mother for pulling me away from my cowboy and my slot machine. I looked forward to the day when I’d be old enough to gamble too.
I gamble now but I don’t shop. I’m not one of those women who loves to roam the malls and boutiquey streets and buy clothes. I think the last time I went shopping was over a year ago. Well, maybe a month ago. It’s too confusing. There’s all these clothes and you have to take off your clothes and try them on, and some don’t fit, and some do, and the ones you like, they don’t have your size, and there’s no salesgirl around to help when you need it and when you don’t need it, she’s there bugging you with that fake smile and too cheery voice. To me, it’s just not worth the hassle. My husband says I’m the first woman he’s doesn’t mind going shopping with. Yeah, ‘cause it’s only once a year. And when I do go I just run into a store, quickly look around and end up buying whatever the mannequin is wearing. It looks good on her, she seems happy, that’s enough.
So I’m not a shopper. I’m a gambler. Last week my best friend paid five hundred dollars for a pair of Christian Louboutin shoes. I put five hundred dollars into a video poker machine at an Indian casino. And I don’t regret it. Not one bit.
July 2, 2003
Monday I gambled away five hundred dollars at the Pechanga Indian Resort Casino.
It was fun.
I played poker machines then switched to a little Blackjack. I was up for a while and then I lost. And then I went to the cash machine again and again and again. On the way to the cash machine a fourth time I actually saw an Indian. A tall proud-looking man with a long braid down his back. That made me feel good. I think he worked there as a janitor or some kind of maintenance guy. I rationalized my losses by thinking that I had paid his salary for the week. I proceeded to the cash machine thinking about how he deserved a raise and that my continuing to gamble would help provide it.
I don’t gamble often. Maybe once a year or so. The last time we went to Palm Springs we went to the Indian Casino there. I lost then too. That was about a month ago. So it’s been two times I’ve gambled this year. Oh, then there was the time before that, that we went to Pechanga. I think that was about three months ago. But really, we don’t go that often. We don’t.
Gambling is something I’ve never been able to control. I’ll play till the last dollar is gone and then apologize to the valet for not having money to tip. Maybe I love it so much because I come from a family of gamblers. As long as I can remember my parents would play poker with my aunts and uncles every Friday night. It became the highlight of my week. They’d come over with their kids and while they gambled, we kids would have fun. You know, the good kind of fun like before there were video games and VCR’s and computers. We’d have water drinking contests, give each other Indian burns and tell spooky stories. Then there were the board games; Scrabble, Monopoly, Risk, Bingo. We stay up late till we hit the silly hour when you get giddy and laugh at anything, a burp, a fart, a booger joke. We’d laugh till we peed our pants and then we’d fall asleep, exhausted.
My father’s family lived in Michigan. Every summer we’d drive across the country to visit them but the first stop of the trip was always Reno. My mother would buy my sister and me some hamburgers and comic books and leave us in the Greyhound bus station while she and my father went off to gamble. It wasn’t as dangerous as it sounds. It was safer back then, I guess, to leave a six year old alone in a bus station. Anyway, we’d sit on orange plastic furniture and eat our bus station burgers. And while my sister read ‘Betty and Veronica,’ I’d wander off to watch cowboys play the slot machines in the bus station lobby.
Once I made friends with one of the cowboys. He was tall, of course, to a six year old, everybody was tall. But at the treetop top of this beanpole of a man was a huge white cowboy hat that he had tilted back on his head to leave breathing room for his large hooked nose. He smiled a lot and paid attention to me, so I stuck around. He was playing a silver dollar machine and I stood next to him and watched, reciting Hail Mary’s to help him win. It was a huge shiny machine with three windows with rotating pictures of a bell, cherries, a plum and an orange. Then there was this black bar that said Jackpot. You wanted to get three of those. On the side of the machine was a long silver handle with a black knob at the top. The cowboy would give that knob a white knuckle grab and pull it down, like he was yanking the horns of a runaway bull. Gears would grind and click, click, click, the fruit would appear in the window and if I prayed hard enough, silver dollars would come clanking out an opening in the bottom and fall into a metal tray. And every time he won, the cowboy would look down at me grin this wide toothy smile and tell me to keep on praying, it was working. I’d pray even harder wishing I had brought my rosary beads with me for that extra prayer power boost. Me and the cowboy were partners. Bells were ringing, coins were clanging. God, I wanted to reach up and pull that handle then stick my hand out and feel the weight of those cold silver dollars as they tumbled down into it.
When my mother came back to check on us, she yanked me away from my cowboy. She didn’t even let me keep the silver dollar he gave me as thanks for all my prayers. I resented my mother for pulling me away from my cowboy and my slot machine. I looked forward to the day when I’d be old enough to gamble too.
I gamble now but I don’t shop. I’m not one of those women who loves to roam the malls and boutiquey streets and buy clothes. I think the last time I went shopping was over a year ago. Well, maybe a month ago. It’s too confusing. There’s all these clothes and you have to take off your clothes and try them on, and some don’t fit, and some do, and the ones you like, they don’t have your size, and there’s no salesgirl around to help when you need it and when you don’t need it, she’s there bugging you with that fake smile and too cheery voice. To me, it’s just not worth the hassle. My husband says I’m the first woman he’s doesn’t mind going shopping with. Yeah, ‘cause it’s only once a year. And when I do go I just run into a store, quickly look around and end up buying whatever the mannequin is wearing. It looks good on her, she seems happy, that’s enough.
So I’m not a shopper. I’m a gambler. Last week my best friend paid five hundred dollars for a pair of Christian Louboutin shoes. I put five hundred dollars into a video poker machine at an Indian casino. And I don’t regret it. Not one bit.
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