Six-and-a-Half Little Words

I was having my morning bagel at the coffee shop when I saw two boys sitting at a table waiting on their parents, who were in line. The older boy was 7 or 8 years old, and he was teaching some card game to his little brother, who looked 4 years old, 5 max.I’m interested in card games, but even more so, the thought processes of children and the pedagogical method generally. Whenever dealers are being trained in a casino, I try to listen in. So I’m eavesdropping on these kids, and I’m watching the younger boy from behind.

Uno and Flower Cards are probably the only home card games that I know, so this game was foreign to me. Each boy had two cards in hand, and the rest of the deck was sitting on the table. I was quite curious to learn what game this was and watch them play it. I think the little boy had Q6. I started to lean in for a closer look, but then right at that moment the older brother says, “Don’t let anyone see your cards.”

And with that, the 4-year-old instantly clutched his cards to his chest like he was shielding a baby from gunfire. My spying was completely shut down, by six-and-a-half little words of instruction—to a 4-year-old. I’ve been hole-carding around the world for about two decades, and a 4-year-old shut me down. Completely.

It was an incredibly cute, profound moment, with so many lessons. The most amazing part of it was that these two boys exhibited preemptive game protection—something the multi-billion-dollar casino industry is incapable of. The boys were not aware of me, and they were the only two playing the game. The older boy saw that the younger brother was holding the cards casually in front of him, and said, “Don’t let anyone see your cards.” “Anyone”? Who? You’re the only two kids in the game, so who are you worried about? Answer: it doesn’t matter. “Anyone” means anyone! It’s a general rule, to be applied all the time, whether there are other players, no other players, a book author spooking the game, or no book authors spooking the game. It doesn’t matter what the game is, and to this day I have no idea what the game was.

Such simple, sage advice. And the student, for his part, didn’t resist the advice. He followed it immediately and seemed to attach great importance to the directive. He didn’t ask, “Well, this isn’t Three Card Poker, so do I really need to protect my cards in this game?” I’ve seen casinos that are too lazy to protect the hole card, except on games that are proven to be targeted by pros. And how do they know what games are targeted by pros? They are reactionary—they wait until they get whacked, and then they protect the game. These kids didn’t wait until I whacked the game and took all their Reeses Peanut Butter Cups and Almond Joys.

The directive to protect the hole cards came before any of the other game rules. The older brother dealt two cards each, then told the little one not to let anyone see his cards. I’ve seen many dealers get trained in casinos, and the instructor spends more time telling the student which hand to pay with than on any legitimate aspect of game protection. Reminds me of the TSA.

Once the kid protected his cards, that was it. There was no angle whatsoever that would give me a glimpse, even with a device or hidden camera. Casinos are so misguided in their paranoia of devices that they seem to think that as long as you have a device like a smart-phone, then you can whack any game. The reality is that if a game is secure, then there’s no camera on earth that will help you in the slightest. Even standing behind this boy from whatever angle I wanted off the table, there was no way to see a thing. That little bugger!

The most impressive part of it is that the instruction did not at all vilify the “anyone” who would possibly see the cards. There was a very matter-of-fact tone, as if to say, “If you hold your cards like that, people will see them, so you don’t want to do that.” It was like closing the gate in the backyard and telling the 4-year-old, “Now don’t let the dogs run away.” Of course, that makes sense, I’d be a fool to leave the gate open, because the dogs might run away. That’s how the world is, and it doesn’t make the dogs evil.

So if I want to catch any hole cards, it looks like I’ll have to wait until these kids show up at the coffee shop again and play the game with the stupid grown-ups.