From about 1975 through 1993, I played a lot of backgammon at the Cavendish West Club in the West Hollywood part of Los Angeles. I probably played 60 hours per week in the 70s, went broke, and starting in 1980, had a full-time job — which cut down on my backgammon hours.

In about 1984, I started to teach myself how to count cards in blackjack and would fly to Las Vegas periodically to play that game. I learned about special deals at casinos where if I played so many hours at $5 or higher blackjack, I’d get some food vouchers and a certain amount in bonus chips. Trust me. Blackjack is easier if you get bonuses to play.

At the Cavendish West, good players from Las Vegas and other cities would occasionally come by to play. This is where I first met Richard Munchkin. I also saw a man named “Henry,” who would play the Cavendish’s best players for $100 a point (a sizeable stake) and usually beat them. 

At some point, Henry became Richard Munchkin’s roommate, and I learned that Henry was a highly-rated chess player and an excellent card counter, in addition to being quite good at backgammon.

I played some chess when I was younger, was getting better at blackjack, and was trying very hard to become good at backgammon. He was miles ahead of me at all three games. 

I figured if I became as good as Henry, my gambling future would be secure. I tried to figure out just how he did that.

I concluded Henry was ahead of me in some combination of three different areas. First was raw brain power. The last IQ test I took was more than 50 years ago while in graduate school, and I was rated well into the top 1% in IQ. With a US population of 215 million in the mid-70s, if 1% of the population was smarter than I was, that’s more than two 2 million people. It’s no wonder that I would run into some of them at a place where intelligence was rewarded. (Today, I believe I’m still in the top 10% IQ-wise, but I’m not sure. As I age, brainpower, among other things, is diminishing.)

The second area where Henry might have been superior to me was in the amount that he studied — or the amount he effectively studied. I studied a lot — but perhaps he studied more or did it in ways that I didn’t. Just having Richard Munchkin as a roommate, if he and Henry discussed various aspects of the games, that was more than what I had. Computer programs, primitive though they were, started to become available in the 1980s. I didn’t get them. Perhaps Henry did.

The third area where Henry might have surpassed me is in aptitude for games. It’s not your raw IQ that counts — it’s the type of IQ. Top chefs, architects, and interior decorators, among many others, probably have high IQs, but that doesn’t mean they have an aptitude for games. Some people are much better strategic thinkers than others. Some people can grasp the overall concepts of a game almost instantly, whereas in the games I mentioned, I needed to learn from what other people had figured out and written.

Whatever the combination of brains, study habits, and aptitude — he had more of what I wanted than I did. So, I wanted to be him.

Obviously, I never became him. After I moved to Las Vegas, I got to know Henry and we became friendly. By the time this happened, I had become successful at video poker and would see him playing that game in some of the casinos I frequented.

I once told him I had wanted to be him in the mid-80s, and he was amazed. He didn’t figure his skill at games was worth all that much. It hadn’t helped him much in the real world. I remember thinking that casinos were the real world.

Today, I have no desire to trade lives with Henry — and I suspect he has no desire to trade lives with me. We each made our way through life the best we could and have generally been successful at this. Although there are some overlapping interests, we really are quite a bit different from each other.

I was using Lyft to get to the airport.  This was a quick business trip while Bonnie stayed home. If I expect to do a lot of walking at my destination, I usually take my walker — and Bonnie and I both use it. This time, though, I was alone and wasn’t expecting a lot of walking, so I left it at home.

Sitting in the back seat, I saw a sign telling me the driver has mostly received perfect (5 out of 5) ratings and that my comfort and safety were his highest concern. And, of course, tips are greatly appreciated. I didn’t mind the sign. The driver is running a business and doing what he can to improve his profits. If his sign accomplishes that, good for him.

As I exited the car at the airport, before I was completely out of the back seat, the Lyft driver started to pull away. It was a compact car and I’m six feet tall, and it takes me a while to exit in that situation. The right rear tire clipped my right heel. When it happened, I didn’t know if I was injured or not — but I was angry that the driver didn’t wait until I was completely out of the car. I look my age, more or less, and it’s not breaking news that seniors are slower and sometimes clumsier at doing things than younger people are. 

The driver stopped immediately. I yelled at him and he kind of looked at me and shrugged. I might have slammed the door a bit more forcefully than I usually do and went into the terminal. I didn’t notice any pain as I walked.

I figured this was a one-off mistake on his part and that he didn’t mean to injure me. There had been minimal conversation in the car and nothing for him to get mad at me about. I surmised that if I reported this, he would suffer consequences. Having a “black mark” on your record is never a good thing.

I debated with myself whether or not to report it. Was his error big enough to warrant him getting a black mark? Rightly or wrongly, I decided it was. Had he immediately jumped out of his seat to make sure I was okay, and apologized profusely along the way, I might have decided differently. But his indifferent “s@%t happens” shrug struck me the wrong way. He seemed to be in a rush to get to his next fare and my welfare was my own problem.

Although I didn’t seem to be injured immediately, if some lingering pain showed up, I wanted a record of the incident.

I didn’t have a lot of time before my flight took off, so I waited until I started to get texts when I was near my destination airport before I did anything. Lyft sent its standard: “Did you enjoy your ride? Rate Antonio’s performance from one to five. How much of a tip do you want to leave Antonio?”

There was a space to write an extended comment, so I wrote that he started to drive away before I was totally out of the car and his tire clipped my foot.

Lyft offered me the chance to chat via text with one of their reps to get this problem resolved. I could have spoken to a live person had I wanted to, but I was still on a full plane and would be for a few more minutes, so I opted for the text chat.

I explained what had happened. I inferred that the rep was female, although I could be wrong. She asked me if I was injured? “I’m not sure,” I replied. “I’m not in pain now, but right now I’m still on the plane. I’ll know more after I walk to baggage claim, and I’ll know even more tomorrow.”

She told me she had contacted the driver and he and I would be separated from him in the system — presumably meaning he would never be my driver again. I don’t know if what other repercussions, if any, Antonio faced. 

She kept pressing me to declare myself okay — and I kept demurring. “I need more time.” She gave me a deadline to keep texting or the claim would be declared resolved, I waited until a minute before the deadline and said I still needed more time.

By now, a different rep had been assigned to the case and needed time to orient herself with the situation. That agent never got back to me.

The next day I received a text message from a lawyer representing Lyft. Apparently, a claim had been opened, and she was there to find out the status of my injuries — and whether or not I was going to sue.

I decided to wait for a few days to see if any lingering pain existed. So I temporized with, “I’m consulting a lawyer about this. I will give him your contact number and the claim number.”

As I write this, it is a week after the incident, and I have no physical pain whatsoever from the incident. “No harm no foul,” as announcers are fond of saying in basketball.

Except there was a foul. Antonio drove away too hastily and I could have been hurt – or worse. The fact that I wasn’t was fortunate.

But since I’m not injured, I’m not going to sue either Antonio or Lyft. That sounds like way too much hassle and since I wasn’t hurt badly, a judge (or jury) wouldn’t likely award me very much, if anything. I could fake injury, of course, but that’s not my style at this time of my life. Back when I was “hurting for money,” possibly I would have used some trickery in order to get some cash, I’m not sure, but not today.

Lyft, of course, is ultimately responsible, but this was a freak incident that could have just as easily happened to Uber or any cab company. So, I’m still going to utilize Lyft to get back and forth to the airport. But I probably will start saying, “I’m slow” when I exit the back seats of cars. 

Ironically, had I taken my walker with me this never would have happened. The driver would have been forced to get the walker out of his trunk (or wherever he had stored it), and by that time I would have been well out of the car.