{"id":309,"date":"2008-01-21T09:38:12","date_gmt":"2008-01-21T13:38:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.summerofjim.com\/2008\/01\/21\/uncle-saul-didnt-blink-once\/"},"modified":"2009-03-13T10:22:50","modified_gmt":"2009-03-13T14:22:50","slug":"uncle-saul-didnt-blink-once","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/summerofjim.com\/?p=309","title":{"rendered":"Uncle Saul Didn’t Blink Once"},"content":{"rendered":"

When I talk with friends about life’s experiences and what we remember about family and growing up, I hear plenty about Uncles.<\/em> \u201cMy Uncle taught me how to whittle wood.\u201d \u201cMy Uncle took me fly fishing.\u201d \u201cMy Uncle took me snow-shoeing.\u201d \u201cMy Uncle taught me how to start a camp fire.\u201d <\/p>\n

At this point, I have to offer, \u201cMy Uncle taught me how to play Gin.\u201d<\/p>\n

Well… it’s true. Uncle Saul taught me how to play Gin. When other kids were learning the early lessons of casting or how to carve away from your hand, I was being instructed in the finer points of \u201cfour-of-a-kind\u201d and \u201cstraight runs.\u201d My hands were so small that it took both of them to hold all 10 cards.<\/p>\n

The basics of the game aren’t hard. You have to accumulate cards in groups of no less than three. They can be all the same card \u2013 like 3 or 4 jacks, for example. Or in runs<\/em> in the same suit \u2013 a 4,5,6 & 7 of Clubs, for example. You start with ten cards, arrange your hand appropriately into like cards or runs… and then begin drawing cards and discarding cards ’til your hand has 2 groups of three and 1 group of four before your opponent can do the same… upon completing this you say \u201cGin!\u201d and you win the hand.<\/p>\n

There’s more… \u201cknocking\u201d and \u201ctrash talking\u201d among other things; but we’ll get to that in due course as my story unfolds.<\/p>\n

My Father worked on Saturdays (except for the Summer), and sometimes for a change of pace<\/em> Mom would take me up to Woodbury for the day to visit my Aunt and Uncle.\u00a0Once Mom and Aunt Meggie\u00a0went off for an afternoon of shopping\u00a0and left\u00a0me in the care of my Uncle Saul. We\u00a0spent an hour or so outside the house raking leaves.\u00a0 I loved to rake leaves… trying to create a pile worthy to jump into.\u00a0 When Saul deemed that we had accomplished the task at hand we returned to the inside.\u00a0The outdoor activity was merely a prelude for the more important activity to be pursued inside.<\/p>\n

Uncle Saul cleared the table in the kitchen nook, took out a fresh legal pad, two sharpened pencils (one for keeping score, the other for doodling), and a deck of cards. He poured me a glass of milk and a glass of white birch beer for himself.<\/p>\n

\u201cOK, let’s see here.” He drew a line down the middle of the paper,\u00a0“Jimmy. Uncle Saul. 25 points for gin, 10 points for under knocking.\u00a0200 points to win.\u00a0 I’ll deal, and it will be your first pick.\u201d<\/p>\n

It took me longer to organize my hand. Uncle Saul knew this,\u00a0he took\u00a0a sip of his birch beer and began his doodle. Uncle Saul\u00a0was a doodler. Aunt Meggie said, \u201ca major doodler.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe knock card is seven.\u201d<\/p>\n

I was\u00a0looking at a bad hand. Nothing is solid<\/em>, no threes of a kind to begin, no runs of three. I do have the 3 and 4 of clubs, and the 6 and the 7 of clubs. Getting the 5 of clubs would be sweet.<\/p>\n

\u201cHow’s school Jimmy?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOK.\u201d Actually I hate school. This is an old story, and Uncle Saul knew this.\u00a0 Uncle Saul discarded a 5 of spades<\/em> and I blinked.<\/p>\n

\u201cDon’t blink Jimmy. It tells me that you needed the 5 of clubs<\/em>. You have a club run because you passed on the 5 of diamonds.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nuts. I had a crummy hand. Saul knew I’m in a club run. And he reminded me how much I hated school. He had taken the advantage. He picked up my Queen of Diamonds discard. \u201cUncle Saul, I think I have a stomach ache.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cStomach ache? Nah! Maybe a little queasy because you have an open club run, you just gave me a present of the Queen of diamonds… you probably have other unattached face cards, I’m a card away from Gin… that’s why you have an ache.\u201d<\/p>\n

The stomach ache maneuver didn’t work as I had hoped. Saul had given me no sympathy. He picked up my Queen; but I thought he was\u00a0speculating<\/em> off the deck. I bet he was\u00a0hunting for the Jack. I bet he had unattached face cards! If\u00a0I could only\u00a0draw the 5 of clubs off the deck!<\/p>\n

\u201cUncle Saul… I bet Aunt Meggie is out spending a lot of money with my Mom.\u201d Thinking back on it now… that was a low shot. But this was Gin, and Saul had taught me that you had to get an edge in the talk… <\/em>particularly if you had a bad hand. He drew a card. No blink. He discarded a Jack of diamonds! OK, he wasn’t collecting a diamond run. <\/p>\n

I drew a 10 of diamonds, scratch the card on the table and discarded it. Saul’s eyes lit up, picked up the 10, \u201cGin!!\u201d<\/p>\n

He was collecting Queens and 10s! \u201cLet’s see… that’s 15, 21, 28, 34… and <\/em>25 for Gin! 59 for Uncle Saul! That’s a good start! I deal again!\u201d<\/p>\n

59, geeze… I just got killed on the first hand.\u00a0 I had better cards on hand #2 and got some good draws off the deck.\u00a0 I got antsy waiting for my Gin card to appear… and Uncle Saul kept drawing cards off the deck, re-arranging his cards with every draw.\u00a0 I couldn’t wait any longer.\u00a0 “I’m knocking with four.”<\/p>\n

“Let’s see… I get to lay off my King of Hearts on to your Kings, the 9 of Spades goes to your Spade run… the 6 goes to your Diamond run.\u00a0 There, four for the knock… that leaves 11.\u00a0 Jimmy, 11.\u00a0 You should have waited to go Gin, I had gornisht, <\/em>you would have killed me!\u00a0 You deal.”<\/p>\n

Don’t ask me how.\u00a0 I have always been a good shuffler of cards.\u00a0 Not like I’m a shark <\/em>or anything… but I could always shuffle a deck, even with small hands.\u00a0 Other kids could run faster, smarter in school, handy with tools… I could shuffle cards.<\/em><\/p>\n

“The knock card is 3.\u00a0 Your pick Uncle Saul.\u00a0 Ahhhh.\u00a0 Uncle Saul picks up the lovely 3 of Hearts.\u00a0 You always pick up low cards on the first pick.\u00a0 Uncle Saul has 3s.”<\/p>\n

“Just play, Jimmy.”<\/p>\n

“That’s a good doodle Uncle Saul.\u00a0 It looks like a Napoleon Cannon.\u00a0I like the Civil War.\u00a0 Uncle Saul doesn’t pick up the 4 of Hearts.\u00a0 I knew he was collecting 3s!”<\/p>\n

“It’s a 24 pound cannon.\u00a0 You learn a lot in school.\u00a0 Not into Kings this time?”<\/p>\n

“I like books on the Civil War.\u00a0 That and Dinosaurs.\u00a0 If we learned good stuff like that in School maybe I wouldn’t hate it as much.”\u00a0\u00a0I drew the deuce of spades to complete my Ace, 2, 3, 4 run.\u00a0 I took the card, put it into my hand using my elbow to fit it snuggly into its proper place.\u00a0 Saul taught me that… “Gin!! Ha-hoo!”<\/p>\n

“You didn’t blink this time.\u00a0 You’re learning.\u00a0 You have my deuce!\u00a0 Ach!\u00a0 OK, you get five… hardly worth the trouble.\u00a0 And watch the ‘ha-hoos.<\/em>‘”<\/p>\n

“Plus<\/u><\/em> 25 for going ‘Gin.'”<\/p>\n

“Plus 25 for Gin!\u00a0 30… you’re getting closer!\u00a0 OK, time for a snack.”<\/p>\n

I would learn later that this ploy was meant to alter the momentum<\/em>.\u00a0 It’s like calling a time-out after your opponent goes on a 15-2 tear in basketball.\u00a0 Saul felt I was getting a little too lucky.\u00a0 Uncle Saul brought a greasy brown bag from the fridge and two small plates. He poured me another glass of milk, and poured himself a glass of milk, too.\u00a0 From the brown bag he took out a white block of something.\u00a0 <\/em>He took out a sharp knife and cut off a\u00a0healthy slab, divided that into two pieces, and placed one on each of our plates.<\/p>\n

“What’s this Uncle Saul?”<\/p>\n

“This Jimmy, is the<\/em> staff of life<\/em>.\u00a0 It’s the perfect food!”<\/p>\n

I smelled it.\u00a0 “It’s doesn’t smell great.”\u00a0 I touched it, “I\u00a0doesn’t feel too good either, sorta oily.\u00a0What is it?”<\/p>\n

“Jimmy, this\u00a0is halvah.<\/em>\u00a0 Nothing better.”<\/p>\n

“What’s in it?”<\/p>\n

“You don’t want to know.\u00a0 This is the food of Kings!\u00a0 Try some!”<\/p>\n

“It’s sort of dry.\u00a0 It’s sticking to the top of my mouth… like peanut butter.”<\/p>\n

“That’s what the milk is for!\u00a0 Have another bite… and have a good gulp of milk.”<\/p>\n

I nodded, “Pretty good.”<\/p>\n

“I bet they don’t give you this in school!”<\/p>\n

Well, he got that right.\u00a0 School lunches were the worst.\u00a0 On that basis alone I would have to concentrate on this halvah stuff.\u00a0 It had a strange fiberous consistency that I was getting used to (Ellen would say that it was like eating soap)… there was sweetness; but not an obvious sweetness.\u00a0 And it made sense with the milk.\u00a0 Filling, too.\u00a0 “This is good, Uncle Saul.”<\/p>\n

“Would I steer you wrong?\u00a0 Jimmy, if you get trapped on a desert island and only had two foods, you could live well with only milk and halvah.\u00a0 The New England Journal of Medicine wrote about it… it constitutes a perfect diet!\u00a0 Now…\u00a0let’s get back to the matter at hand… it’s your turn to deal.”<\/p>\n

If you are curious… I didn’t beat Uncle Saul at Gin that afternoon.\u00a0 He made a recovery after our snack break and took the next five hands and I went down to a sharp defeat.\u00a0 I lost the next two games, too.\u00a0 After the game he gave me his drawing of the 24 pound Napoleon.\u00a0 I came across that drawing in a bunch of old papers a few years ago.<\/p>\n

I don’t eat halvah all that much… but when I do I think of Saul.\u00a0 I am not so sure about its health value.\u00a0 Of this I am sure… that if you smear some halvah on your face, you can actually hear <\/em>pimples growing.\u00a0\u00a0And I tell you\u00a0another thing: when I looked at Saul on the afternoon when he told me that stuff about the New England Journal of Medicine, he didn’t blink once.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When I talk with friends about life’s experiences and what we remember about family and growing up, I hear plenty about Uncles. \u201cMy Uncle taught me how to whittle wood.\u201d \u201cMy Uncle took me fly fishing.\u201d \u201cMy Uncle took me … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-309","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-meggie-saul"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/summerofjim.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/summerofjim.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/summerofjim.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/summerofjim.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/summerofjim.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=309"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/summerofjim.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/summerofjim.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=309"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/summerofjim.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=309"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/summerofjim.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=309"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}