My father was a great magician. Thus, it should come as no surprise that I had more than a few occasions to test his skills at card playing.
It started out when I was young with Go Fish where every matching set of cards we would put down would instantly transform into trinkets we would tally at game’s end.
As I got older, the games got more sophisticated: Poker and Pinocle entered our repertoire, along with some Tarot-themed games I learned from Poppy and the Wanderlores.
Before long, we were hoarding cards for those role-playing games where custom-built hands were part of the strategy, though I have to admit that neither of us were constrained enough to play by the official rules.
Of course, it was hard to play by the rules of any game when every card you touched was tainted with magic: Unwanted cards burst into flames, character cards transformed into three-dimensional players, and action cards became the informal script of an adventure we would embellish with our imagination.
Sometimes, I couldn’t seem to get a decent hand. Other times, the good luck never seemed to end. Most of the time, my father and I matched each other’s skill, so we took turns at savoring that oh-so-sweet win.
It didn’t occur to me then, how much life was like a game of cards. No matter how crappy the cards I currently hold may be, my luck can change with every turn I take.
So, I keep playing, though I can’t guarantee that I won’t torch the next lousy card that enters my hand—just to give that all important good luck a fighting chance.
—Jellybean Reds, Creator of Little Creatures
