My mother’s younger sisters were ages 15 and 13 when I was born. So by the time I got to the fun age, no diapers or bottles, my aunts started teaching me the fundamentals of being a girl. In essence, they to me how to dance (the jitterbug was popular back then), and how to play poker, the two absolutely necessary accomplishments for dateable girls.
The jitterbug was never very useful, but the poker playing was extremely lucrative. I marched in the band as a flag girl, complete with an extremely short skirt and white boots. The band, cheerleaders, and football players were transported by bus to the away games. On some of the longer trips, a few of the guys would pull out a deck of cards and start a penny ante poker game in the back four seats of the school bus.
I let a couple of games go by before I walked back and asked, “What are you guys doing?” “Playing Five Card Stud, want to play?” came back the answer from one of the guys with a twinkle in his eyes. “Well, I’ve never played poker before; you will have to teach me how.” I replied innocently. “Oh, don’t worry about that, we will be happy to teach you!” So they all shifted around and made room for me to sit down and dealt the first hand of cards. We all tossed in a penny for the ante and picked up our cards. The guy to the left of me got a slight smile on his face and tossed in a quarter, the guy next to him folded and the next guy upped the bet by a dime, by the time my turn came around there was $3.00 in the pot, I acted dumb and showed my hand, a straight flush, “Is this good enough to bet on?” Everybody threw down their cards and handed me the money.
The next guy dealt the cards and again we tossed in the penny for the ante and the next guy started the betting. Around we went, with me not asking just upping the bet by a nickel. Finally, everyone but me and the guy across from me had folded. He put down his cards with 2 pair, a pair of 4s and a pair of 3s. I laid down my hand and again asked, “Is this any good?” I had 2 pair also, a pair of aces and a pair of kings. This time there was $4.00 in the pot and we had reached the game and it was time to get off the bus. I looked at the guys and said, “Thank you for letting me win. It was exciting for my first time playing poker.” The most I ever won playing poker on the band bus was $60. By then, the guys all knew that I really knew how to play poker and started to play my favorite game, blackjack. That was lucrative too. Needless to say, I had a great time going to away games with the band, but I never went to band camp.
