I celebrated my independence by going to work and proving that I could work and pay my bills, all by myself…nothing new here, I’ve been doing it for years but it just sounds cool since it’s the day that we sing out our independent ‘we are Americans and damn proud of it, love it or leave it’, type of attitude.

More than once when someone has ragged America in my presence, I’ve said very clearly, “Get the fuck out of here if you don’t like it.” That’s still how I feel about it. This country allow us to express ourselves, be what we want to be, and protects us from the tyranny of those that want to steal freedom. I love the USA.

*****

My shift found me spending time with the people that walk through the doors of Bellagio’s poker room. There were a lot of them and I was only one so I mingled with as many as possible between games, and mostly dealt until my name came up on the EO list. It was 1 a.m. and my Friday. I hit the door. Man was it a hot one here in Vegas.

Drum roll….But before Linda leaves the building…let me introduce you to Dominique and his wife, Lisa.

They play $1-$5 7 Card Stud and never venture into another game or limit. Dom is about 5’5″ and very fragile, in his 80’s (I believe), cantankerous, opinionated, out spoken, prejudiced, and those really are his good points.

Lisa is educated, and carries pretty much the same qualities as Dom except that she’s about 5’8″ and more solid than Dom in physical stature. She appears to be somewhere in the mid to late 60’s.

They dominate any game they play in, often playing in the same game although they don’t sit next to each other. Dominate as in win? No! Dominate as in they watch everything like a hawk watches a mouse peek out of it’s burrow and try to sneak across the meadow without winding up being dinner.

If a new player makes a string bet, before I can say anything, Lisa pounces on him, ripping him into shreds, acting as if he tried to steal her pocket book while she was watching her grandchild swing in the park.

The poor beginner begins to apologize as he looks at her steely countenance and cold, unforgiving eyes.

My normal procedure is to look directly at her, in a soft voice, I say, “I’ll take care of it!”

I have to put my hand out to her to enforce the fact that I’m going to handle it…not her. She accepts that but she watches and waits for the next transgression so she can jump in and attack.

Dom is another story. He seems to think that he has a shield because he’s old and frail. Or because he’s Dom. Or for some nonsensical reason, he believes he cannot be harmed, or get into trouble, when he bows his head and charges at the person he feels has crossed the line and made a mistake. Ninety nine percent of the time, the person has not made a mistake but according to Dom World, he has.

A few weeks ago, Lisa was in the 1s, Dom in the 8s. A new player sat down in the 4s. He was about 40ish, jovial, smiling, waiting for the chip runner to bring his chips, and chewing gum. He popped it with each chew.

The attack began, from Lisa, “You aren’t going to do that all the time you’re playing are you?”

The 4s was startled, as if someone kicked the back legs off of his chair and he hadn’t yet fallen but felt the tremor starting. “Do what?”

“Pop your gum!”

His mouth fell open with the absurdity of the question, he even stopped chewing for a few seconds. He looked at me and I started to smile. He smiled back as he chewed like he was pumping oxygen to the World with each bite.

She snorted, “That’s shows you have no education.”

He chewed furiously, snapping and popping as fast as he could. I wanted to belly laugh but couldn’t…yes, I do behave myself at times.

That is a minor example of what goes on when Lisa and Dom dominate a game. There are lots of other stories but I don’t have the time right now.

Tonight I slipped into the Dealer’s Box of a $1-$5 7 Card Stud game in which Dom was in the 3s, Lisa was his sweater, and he was just buying in…the chip runner was bringing his chips. Dom and Lisa were the only two people I knew in the game.

The 7s was ‘Mama’ and her sweater was her son. Mama was about the same age as Lisa and the son was around 40ish.

I’m horrible with nationalities so let’s just say the 7s and her sweater were not speaking English. I told them they had to speak English once the cards were dealt. After she had cards, they were talking and she showed him her cards. I explained the ‘one player to a hand’ rule, and told them they couldn’t talk while she had cards.

Lisa went off on the fact that they were talking about the cards. How the hell would she know? I couldn’t even hear or understand what they were saying. I said to Lisa, “It’s ok. I’ve explained the rules.”

The next hand, the 7s showed her cards to her son before she threw them away, and it’s possible that the 6s seat could have seen them. Before I could turn the hand over or even blink, the argument started. Lisa blew up with, “She’s showing her cards to him!”

I’m not sure who ‘him’ was but it’s ok to show your cards to a sweater, after all…Dom was showing Lisa his cards.

Dom went into a belligerent rant about how she couldn’t show her cards and she needed to just stop playing if she was going to play that way.

Yep…this is $1-$5 limit where everyone normally has fun and just kicks back.

Mama stood up and held her arm across her son’s chest. Son looked like he was going to get up and go down the table to visit Dom. I did a, “Stop it! Let’s all play friendly. We’re here to have fun.”

Dom was still in the middle of having his fit and he wasn’t about to be slowed down, he shook his fist at the Son and Mama and adamantly demanded, “Go back to the country you came from!”

The son was really trying to stand up now but Mama had him sort of pinned to the chair and I tried one more time, “That’s enough!”

Dom kept trying to mouth something and by now Lisa knew he’d crossed the line, she was pulling on his arm and I looked directly at him with, “You are going to have to stop now!”

He stopped. I had the chip runner ask Nate to come over, he did. I explained that we’d had a little problem between players and they seemed to be settled now, but he might have to return later.

Nate said, “Fine. Just call me if you need me.”

Now Mama went all-in and lost the hand. She pulled out a $20 and I told her she needed to buy $25. She motioned to be dealt out. She sent her son to the cashier’s cage to buy her $20 worth of blue chips. When he returned, she kept her hand over the chips until the next hand started and then threw out her ante, expecting to be dealt in.

Dom and Lisa were ready to pounce again…I had no intention of dealing her in unless she had the correct amount but the hawks were just waiting for the little field mouse…

I told Mama she had to have $25. Her son spoke to her in their language, she argued, then finally he dug into his pocket and pulled out money for her. I felt a little heart tug for him. He acted like he didn’t want to be there but felt he should stay with her, then he had to dig out money so he could be somewhere he didn’t want to be…I looked at him and mouthed, “I’m sorry!”

He smiled. “It’s ok!”

I know this is strange but I get a kick out of Dom and Lisa. He’s set in his ways, grouchy, narrow minded, opinionated, and he has his wife to kick around when no one else will put up with him. She’s educated, a classic in dress and etiquette, quite charming when she wants to be and gets to do her share of the kicking at the table, in other words, she gets to be the kicker instead of the kickee.

I left the table with Lisa and Dom policing the game, armed with talons and quick wings to attack anyone that threatened to have fun or even looked like they didn’t know what they were doing.