The cards we are dealt
A full deck in the making
The Game, replete with ever-changing rules, circumstances and personalities swirls around us,
mocking every player’s aching need for predictability and forces us to play the cards we are
dealt.
The players
There are people who can read the cards. There are people who can call the cards. There are people who can count the cards. There are people who live for the game. There are people who won’t play by the rules, and there are people who don’t even know there are rules.
We all play to win, but the melancholy truth is that whether we cut, shuffle, or mark the cards our effort to improve the odds is futile. We never get to decide chance. We are afraid that losing will be our penance for the sin of hubris. That’s why most of us fold one card too early.
We are handicapped by our nature and terminally deluded as to our chance of ever seeing what’s actually going on. We are condemned to feel the elephant blindfolded.
Of course, for the most part, that suits us just fine.
The rules
I spend a lot of time thinking about chance, and take refuge and comfort in the possibility that every calamity, every calumny, every catastrophe has its genesis in our own tactical errors. We author our misfortune: it may be chaos, but at least we own it.