"Six Screens and a Cold Coffee"

A fellow I'll call Gil came by the hall last spring to see the old photographs on my wall. He was in his forties, soft spoken, with the tired eyes of a man who slept in pieces. We got to talking, and he told me he was a trader.

He showed me his phone. Six little charts, green and red, jumping like fish in a bucket. He said he'd set up six screens at home, too, in the spare room. He said it with some pride and some shame at once, and I knew that mix of feelings like I know my own handwriting.

I asked him what a good day felt like. He thought about it. "Like I'm awake," he said. I asked about a bad day. "Like I have to get back in before it closes."

Gil told me he checked his accounts before he got out of bed. He skipped his daughter's recital to watch a number. He'd stopped saying how much he was down, even to his wife.

I didn't tell him he was a gambler. Nobody ever heard that word and thanked me for it. I told him about the back room of a pool hall in Tulsa, where I called myself a professional too. I had a hat and a rule book and a very serious face. The name made me feel like a man with a career instead of a man with a problem.

A name can be a blanket. It can keep you warm right up until the house is gone.

Here's all I know. When your heart speeds up before you act, and a loss makes you want to act again, ask whether you are deciding or scratching an itch. Then let someone who loves you look at the numbers with you.

He called me last week. He had turned off two of the screens and told his wife the figure. He said it was the worst hour and the best hour of his year.

If you recognize yourself in Gil, the National Problem Gambling Helpline is 1-800-MY-RESET, and it's there any hour you need it.

A desk and a chair do not make a habit into a job.

Sal