The Gambler.

With all my love to Jean Strickland

I have no idea how to start this other than very plainly. My Mom passed away last month. I feel as though the shock of it all is just now starting to set in. Part of me feels like maybe it “shouldn’t” feel so shocking. It was not as if I didn’t think about the possibility of this moment 10,000 times since April. But I thought we were out of the woods. I most certainly would have never guessed that this is what I would be sharing the next time I wrote to you. Of course this was an inevitable something that was always coming down the road… I knew it was likely not decades away, but I also didn’t think it was right around the corner either. I’m so grateful for the time we had. And there really doesn’t seem like there’s ever enough of it. I suspect I will always be greedy for her.

She was really recovering. She washed her hair on her own again for the first time. She typed a sentence on the computer without struggle. To both of our surprise and delight she remembered her social security number again off the cuff when asked for it. She far exceeded the expectation of damn near every neurologist we spoke to at the beginning of all of this. It had become common to hear, that based on her scans and chart - the person she was, was not the person whichever doctor was expecting to see before them. She was physically strong, and though she needed a walker outside, she was getting more solid all the time. We were talking, and laughing, and crying, and cuddling. Her speech therapist was trying her best to convince her that her progress was amazing even though it didn’t feel like it to her. We were making big decisions together - like her coming back to NY with me this month when her lease was up.

And she had another stroke.

And it became time to honor the wishes she’d shared with my sister and I over the course of our lives together. The doctor told us it was peaceful. I want to tell you everything, and I want to tell you nothing. There is so much to do, and all I want to do is rest, and so am finding that I can’t really do either. I feel her and our love so deeply, and I don’t know that I’ve ever experienced a pain like this before. Beauty and devastation holding hands so tightly. Sometimes I can see it all with the bird’s eye view of an eagle and sometimes only the foresight of an ant.

My Mom would always say that my biggest issue is that I don’t know when to let go. And even though I would usually reply to that statement with an annoyed sigh and a roll of my eyes. I could never deny it. My biggest reoccurring issue is, in fact, not knowing when to let go. And I’ve never wanted to let go less in my life than in this moment. My Mom, on the other hand, in true Scorpionic fashion has always been adept at exactly when to let go. She has a natural sense for when the wind is turning, or that the party’s over. Never premature, but also never waiting until the wheels fall off. True precision.

It made her a really great gambler.

She loved playing the slots especially. Sometimes I’d go to the casino with her - for me it was fun for exactly 45 minutes, around that time is about when I’d start thinking of all of the things I could have bought with the money I just lost. She would say that gambling only becomes a problem if you don’t know when to stop. That you have to go in with a number in mind of what you’re willing to lose. When you hit that number, don’t be tempted by the lure of “one more pull”, the fun is over - it’s time to go. On the flip side, was knowing when enough was enough on the winning end of things. She’d say the other temptation is when people win, they start feeling invincible, get greedy, and end up losing their gains and then some.

She’d usually come home with something that she would then share with my sister and I.

She would mostly go with her old co-worker friends, and sometimes she’d go solo when what she called “The Voice” told her to go. On those days, it wasn’t social, she was sure to win. Afterward she’d call me up with a casual hushed tone, trying her very best to sound like she had something serious to tell me and either say “I heard The Voice today.” or “How are you doing for money? … Cause I just got back from the casino” and then I would tell her this was my favorite way to gamble.

She never stopped trying to teach me how to play the game even though I had absolutely zero aptitude for it. She would often apply the philosophies to whatever dramas were currently happening in my life, both major and minor. And then jokingly sing the hook from the old Kenny Rogers song with a fake country twang:

You gotta know when to hold ‘em
Know when to fold ‘em
Know when to walk away
And know when to run

The past several months have been an awful and awe-some season of letting go. Not a corner of my life spared from my fingers being pried open from the gripping of it. Watching everything fall away like sand - New York, my studio, my home, all manner of relationships, survival jobs, my perceived control, and now what makes the importance of all the others absolutely pale in comparison… my Mom.

One of my Mom’s values is quality of life. She has always said that if she can’t really live she doesn’t want to be here. Kept as a body just for the sake of it. She knows how to play any hand well. She’s pulled wins out of impossible odds her entire life. And she’s also been brave enough to get up from many tables where people have all but begged her to give it one more go.

Funnily enough, I never really listened to the song (called The Gambler) she so often quoted. She didn’t actually play it in the car where we listened to music most, cause that was usually filled with old soul, classic rock, or top 40. Though I vaguely remember seeing the muppet version once or twice - being the elder Millennial I am - I was really on the other side of the golden age of Jim Henson, and I’m so sorry Gen X, don’t tell anyone, but I hated The Muppet Show. Still, a couple of days ago, I woke up with it stuck in my head.

I decided to give it a real listen.

Two gamblers on a train bound for nowhere. If you’ve read all the way to the bottom of this Maquette, you can imagine my surprise when the elder of the two says:

Son, I've made a life
Out of readin' people's faces
Knowin' what the cards were
By the way they held their eyes
So if you don't mind my sayin'
I can see you're out of aces
For a taste of your whiskey
I'll give you some advice"

He goes on to share:

Every gambler knows
That the secret to survivin'
Is knowin' what to throw away
And knowin' what to keep

Before I left Seattle I told my boyfriend I wanted to hit up Muckleshoot Casino which we called “The Mucks”, because it was - if not her favorite, then the one I accompanied her to the most. It was somehow both very different than I remembered and exactly the same. Dizzying carpets. and bright computer blue light screens from every direction. The sound of fake coins clanking amongst the cacophony of beeps, dramatic sound effects, and the music of each game. I lead him to the smoking side - yes, where people still smoke indoors, not just because that was the most accurate to the times I spent there with her. But it also feels like where the real players play. A little grizzlier and rougher around the edges. Where people seem more accustomed to the rollercoaster of high highs and low lows from both winning and losing, in the casino and in life.

I found myself repeating all the rules of engagement my Mom has shared with me, as we let ourselves be intuitively guided to the machines whispering our names. As I played, or more like as I indiscriminately hit buttons at machines that felt like they meant something - a dragonfly theme, Cleopatra II, I started to win a bit - much to both of our surprise. He said “I thought you weren’t good at this.” I laugh and tell him I’m not, I ain’t too proud to chalk this up to Jean. Even though I was up from the amount I felt comfortable to lose, I started to sense the familiar wall at the 45 min mark. I hung out, watched, and coached as my Mom’s proxy while David played. Now, this man loves lions and I pointed out about 47 different machines with lion’s on them, all of which he breezed past. We were both just about ready to wrap it up. I said -

We can’t leave here without you playing at least ONE with a lion on it.

He made a quick bee line to a machine on a corner, hit a couple of buttons until the climbing sound of a jackpot hit. Neither of us actually knew what was going on. But the gruff and thin veteran gambler next to us leaned over to watch where the winning landed so we knew we were on to something.

The sound of clinking finally ended. David said “That feels like a good place to stop.” and we cashed the ticket out.

As we left the cashier we realized we had won the exact cost of the last minute plane ticket home to New York I bought earlier that day. We got in Mom’s car to drive back to her now almost empty apartment, we looked at her clock and it said 10:26…
her birthday.

The song continues…

'Cause every hand's a winner
And every hand's a loser
And the best that you can hope for
Is to die in your sleep

And when he'd finished speakin'
He turned back toward the window
Crushed out his cigarette
Faded off to sleep
And somewhere in the darkness
The gambler he broke even
But in his final words
I found an ace that I could keep

David said “thank you, Jean.” and I repeated after him…

Thank you, Jean.

Your Fellow Wanderer,

Allison