Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Vegas Vignettes: Witchy Woman

On the last night, a lovely older woman sat next to me. She looked ordinary enough, but she had a kind of presence. There was something commanding yet kind about her. She held a handful of paper napkins and other sundries which I’m sure had some arcane use.

Well, she sat at the slot machine on my right and after two or three spins she made a disapproving noise. I looked over inquiringly, and with a slight accent, she said that the machine “wasn’t speaking” to her. Of course it wasn’t, I thought. She hadn’t been there for more than a minute, but I just smiled sympathetically. Why not? I was losing too.

She gathered her things and moved over to the machine on my left. I noticed she was only betting about 20 cents a spin, but now she’s pleased. She told me that this machine was speaking to her. I sure couldn’t hear it, but she was happy. She was still losing her 20 cents every time, but getting happier and happier.

I was losing too, playing $1.50 a go, but I was comfortable (we’d eaten an enormous dinner) and just didn’t feel like moving. Moreover, she was pleasant to be around. There was something about her that I liked. We were chatting when she started to win. Small at first, then pretty soon she’d parlayed $5 into about $250. I congratulated her but she only nodded, saying with a smile “I told you, it was speaking to me. I’d better take this out now.”

She took it out, put the ticket in her purse then went back to playing with a fresh $5. Soon her husband arrived, he saw that she had $8.36 and told her to take her winnings out before she lost it. She did, and he took the $8.36 ticket to the cashier. She started to follow, then came back to wink at me. “Good thing I took it out when I did!” Then she patted my machine. “I hope it speaks to you soon.”

That’s when my luck turned, and I won all that money.

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