My dad loved to gamble, he came from a long line of gamblers and both he and my uncle were bookmakers in fact my uncle managed a number of shops until he retired a few years ago. Some of my earliest memories were the sound of Dad whistling at the horse racing on the television, I was amazed at how much noise he could generate. Years after the event he told me that he had won so much money on a bet that he had managed to pay off the mortgage early, he whispered ‘don’t tell your mother’ and I didn’t.
I had a brief but idyllic spell after leaving school of being unable to get a job, lazing around at home, no school no work was totally fantastic but I had heard the rumblings of discontent from both my parents. Apparently Dad had told mum that I could work with him in the betting shop, the one in Soho no less, now if I had known that I would have invented a job and waited for him at the top of the road, Soho had a magical allure for a teenage me. Inevitably, despite her desire to get me working she refused to allow me to work in a betting shop I suspect she thought it would corrupt me but at 17 I wholeheartedly wanted to be corrupted.
I went on to dislike gambling preferring to keep a firm grip on my hard earned money. I have though had a couple of lapses in my time, many years ago whilst working as a London Cabby I picked up a lucky gambler in the west end. He excitedly told me that he had won big that night and as I steered the cab through the dark streets towards Charing Cross Station he replayed every turn of the card and every winning hand until eventually I pulled on to the cobbled forecourt at the front of the station. Still in the cab he asked me if I had had a good night and of course I replied that I had only just started and only had my float cash on me, just in case. He climbed out and came to the nearside window, he held out a leather bag, very similar to the one I used to hold my notes in. He said ‘do you fancy a gamble?’ Well I always want to win but the thought of losing made me feel sick. ‘What kind of gamble?’ I replied. ‘Flick a coin and call heads or tails in the air’ he replied ‘if you win you keep my winnings and if you lose I keep what’s in your money bag’. I looked at the bag then at him and then back to the bag, ‘ok’ I mumbled, I reached into my bag and pulled out a coin. ‘Let me see it’ he said and so I handed the pound coin over, he examined it this way and that before handing it back, ‘go for it’ he said.
Safe to say I drove home empty handed, the lucky gambler had cleaned me out. My dad used to say to me ‘quit while you’re ahead’ and I used to reply ‘how do you know when you’re ahead?’ He would just smile and say ‘you’ve got a lot to learn’. I still have
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