Losing My Pants
The Source
Many people have been known to lose their shirt in a gambling casino, but I think I’m the only guy who lost his pants. I’d won a cruise for two to the Bahamas in a travel writing contest and had invited one of my students along to enjoy six days floating the Caribbean, making daily stops at one little tourist island after another. The Carnival ship had its mandatory gaming casino but frankly, I know nothing about gambling. I’m not overly moral, just stupid. My friend Ed had told me how your chances of being hit by lightening 17 times were greater than winning the Lottery, and since I was a teacher I was already employed in enough sucker’s games. My father once took my brother and I into a Reno, Nevada, restaurant where slot machines lined the walls. Although he spent the bulk of his life in the risk-prone profession of farming, Dad is anti-gambling. He wanted to show us what a rip-off the one-armed bandits could be so he put a quarter into the machine to show Keith and I how the entire state of Nevada was based upon fraud. Dad put in the quarter, the machine clicked, the wheels spun, and the money started pouring out. Dad stared at the pile of quarters spilling out onto the floor, grabbed our hands and marched us back to the motel, frustrated at this lesson in fiscal responsibility. It’s maybe as a result of this that I’ve avoided casinos. Oh, I don’t fault people who patronize these money holes, but I’ve just never been tempted. At the risk of sounding un-American I’ll confess that I’ve never bought a Lottery ticket. Please…please…buy all you like. Every nickel you flush down the state coffers keeps my taxes lower. Yes, I’ve played poker and lost my share, but when it comes to going up against professional dealers in an Alton casino, well….you can take them on. I’ll go outside and try to swim across the Mississippi…something with better odds. I have a friend who, when short of cash, flies to Las Vegas to play blackjack. When he wins enough he comes home. He says he plays smart, knows when to quit, and has a knowledge of the game that will match any dealer. It must work. He manages to pay his bills. Okay…how I lost my pants: Our cruise ship had landed in Nassau and my student and I took the usual scenic tour of the island. We had maybe an hour before our shuttle would arrive to fetch us back to the boat. The only thing on the island seemed to be restaurants, bars, and casinos, and since we’d already eaten, we didn’t drink, and I had a pocket full of quarters, I told young Daniel to stay up in the gawkers gallery while I went down to the gaming floor to get rid of my change. He wasn’t old enough to actually enter the joint so it was his job to look out for the shuttle while his teacher demonstrated a life of sin on the floor below him. I think I may have had five quarters so I searched out the correct machine and started feeding the silver-mouthed giant. I can’t now remember which quarter did the trick, but when the little wheels flipped up “7,” then “7,” then a third “7,” the heavens opened up. I’d never hit a jackpot in my life. I had no change cup to catch the money, no bag, nothing…just my pockets. The electronic system of this particular casino was rigged in such a way that when some lucky sucker hit the mother lode, the circuits exploded. Lights flashed, bells rang, and a red-lighted siren started spinning and wailing atop my machine. Other gamblers gathered ‘round to watch the flood of silver headed my direction. That’s when Daniel started shouting. “Mr. Bradbury! Mr. Bradbury! The bus is here!” “What?” “To the boat! It’s the last bus to the boat! They say we gotta go…Now!” It’s funny how quickly you can estimate the cash flowing onto the floor and compare it to the time it takes to swim out to a departing cruise ship. Although I once earned a couple of Red Cross lifeguard badges I figured I’d never make it with all that cash. I should have chosen a machine that dispersed bills. I began to hurriedly stuff the quarters into my shirt pockets, my pants pockets, my hands, then while the money was still rolling out of the bandit, I clinked and clunked my way up the stairs, leaving a trail of quarters behind me. This is when I learned a valuable lesson on the amount of weight that the average pair of suspenders can carry without flying loose. When I stepped onto the shuttle my pants were down to my knees and the other occupants of the bus applauded. While wondering whether they were congratulating me on my winnings or my knees, I had a flashback to that Reno restaurant of long ago. My family is simply cursed with luck.