Oh Wheely?

 

I’ve got a bit of a jaded view of the Wheel of Fortune…

I spent 12 years working in a Casino and watching the wheel watchers who took meticulous notes…convinced that they could crack the system, break the bank, and walk away a winner… Looking for order in a random universe of mathematical probability theory and ignoring the odds that are stacked against the punter so that over time… it’s always the house that wins…

Not to say that people didn’t walk out winners but that was usually down to the fact that the shift ended and they just happened to be up at that point… But then they’d come back the next day, convinced that they were on a roll and lose their winnings and more on top as they chased their losses as surely their luck would turn… COME ON!!! NUMBER 17!!! Come on…. you’re due in… you’ve not been up for over a 100 spins…

Ouch… fuzzy logic!! and a fast track to a sorry fate…

See the wheel and the ball do not know that 17 has been woefully absent for quite sometime… When you enter the world of the casino wheel… well each spin is like the first spin and no memory of what came before or what will come after… Each spin is independent… there is no causal effect from one spin to the next… Each and every time… the odds remain the same… 1/37… Each and every number has the same odds 1/37…

The house… they have the edge… they pay out at £35 to each £1… slightly lower than actual odds… but given time… well over time that all adds up and Casinos although they can’t control time… they can play with your perception… that is why croupiers don’t wear watches… why there are no windows… and why food and drink is readily and freely available… Casinos want you to stay… long time! Like the Lotus Eaters... Stay and empty your pockets… until that wheel feels like a millstone around your neck…

Yeah!! I am a happy little bunny aren’t I?

But I’ve seen every believer of Luck imaginable…

But that is fast Luck and is fast luck true luck…

I don’t think so… I think fast Luck too soon becomes unstuck…

Now true luck… mmm… See I don’t really believe in that either… see… I think what some people call luck is really just another way of saying that someone refused to give up and kept on trying until they got the result they wanted…

And if you want to call someone lucky… well then I guess it depends at what point in their story that you happen to observe… They may seem to have it all… yet a year or so earlier could have been in deep despair… Or they may seem to have it all now but can they keep it… will it all still be there next year…

Rise and fall… fall and rise…

Then some people talk to me of bad luck and I think really? No… that was not bad luck, that was lack of common sense and planning…

See… I think luck in life is slightly different to Casino luck… as in life… you do get to swing the odds in your favour… though on the flip side… you can also screw them in spectacular  style… mmm… or maybe you’re just on the other side of the table and boss of the pit…

I don’t know… I ponder this a lot… people always look to make patterns and connect the dots and make sense… people rarely understand true odds… often a post match analysis will reveal that actually something that seemed freaky and unusual at the time was actually pretty much par for the course… or maybe that something that seemed to pop up out of the blue had been in fact quietly simmering for a while just waiting for a chance to surface…

See… thing is… I’ve had many things happen over the years that seem impossible to fathom or explain and when I try to pinpoint significant points in my life… well… how do you do that? as all points seem to fractal and touch other things… and each time I look at a point in time and  I think… well things changed there… BUT… I wouldn’t have been there if x,y,z hadn’t happened first… Arggghhhhhh…. with an infinite amount of time to think… I’m sure I’d trace back to the Big Bang itself… but what was before that?

And then of course there’s Mother Nature who will stampede over all the odds… I say that as a Mother who conceived 4 and defied every method of contraception… The term family planning makes me howl with laughter… really you get to plan that?? I’ve always considered that life arrives on it’s own timetable and that my brood is a sequence of serendipitous  outcomes from hugely pleasurable pastimes… 😉

Anyway… I’ll tell you a silly story of how I just happened to land one job… I can’t explain the how and why of it now but maybe at a later time it will all make sense… you know… much like a Tarantino movie…

So… I was getting ready to go to an event and half-dressed and mid-make-up applying and my work phone rang…

I ignored it…

The kids picked it up! MUM!!! answer this!!

Who is it?

With-held number!

Cut it off!

NO!!! ANSWER IT!!! IT’S IMPORTANT!!

So… I answered it and a voice at other end said something…

And I thought it was a prank call and laughed and made sarcastic comments and ha!!! aren’t you the funny one!!

No… I’m serious… I’m from a new company that’s being set up and we’d like to invite you for an interview by phone call…

Yeah… whatev’!

No…I’m being serious… would you like to book a time for interview?

By this point… I mostly just wanted to get back to donning my glad rags and getting my glitter on and I decided that the quickest way to get off the phone was to just agree… so I made an appointment…

Now… Monday…. the time came and went and no call…

Ha!! I knew it was a prank!!

Tuesday… I have a client booked and she rings me… Can I change my time? The cat is ill and I need to go to the vet.

Sure…

So I am at home when I should have been out and the phone rings…

Sorry I’m 10 minutes late

What???

Your interview…

Man!!! You’re 24 hours late!!!

Less than an hour later I’d got the job…

Was that fate?

Who knows?

But I do know that these days, I take less and less at face value and when luck comes knocking… I’m interested to see how it’s dressed…

Is it Luck or is it Loki…

Mmmm… I ask myself… why are you rolling with this…

Synchronicity? Serendipity? Or just stupidity…

😀

Or does it even matter which…

I guess it’s not how you arrive but how you leave that makes you a winner…

Knowing when to stay and play…

And when to walk away…