Bridge Obsession

Since the February bridge holiday, my interest in the game increased significantly. I started to play intermediate bridge and this means that I was invited to play in the room where people play bridge without a social chit chat. It suits me as silence is necessary to really concentrate and I need that to be able to recall rules and conventions I should know and remember. This is not all that easy for me, at least not yet. I came across the statement that I like very much "One of the reasons bridge continues to fascinate players all over the world is that, in order to become even sort of good at it, you have to be willing to be bad at it for a long time".

This knowledge provides me with a great excuse and encouragement when I make mistakes, and I do make them plenty. Now I know that I am on my way to play well as I am willing to play badly. Only for some time, I hope.

My Monday partner, who invited me to play with her, is a very kind lady and a good player.  She points out my mistakes from time to time and since she is doing it nicely and constructively I do not get upset about it. I just learn.

This morning I woke up realizing that I had been dreaming about the last Monday memorable bidding. I must have been re-calculating the game points just before I woke up. In reality we played slam in hearts and I was bidding it! It was a simple bidding really, we had great cards and  almost all other players landed up in a slam contract. For me, however, it was the first time to lead an auction that finished with a slam. As I could not share my emotions until the game was over (I took all tricks – grand slam), my adrenaline was going up and up in silence. When we finished I said quietly – I almost got a heart attack. Partners laughed in a friendly way. They perhaps have not played for a while with such an honest novice.

                                           

Even if it was quite an achievement for me, I understood that it was not a maximum result. We got only 20%. We should have really played grand slam in No Trumps. This would bring the maximum points with our hands. The situation must have been stored in my subconscious and in my dream I was calculating points to figure out optimal biding. My partner first bid was 1NT and this means 15 to 17 points. I had 16 points so I asked for aces. My partner had two of them and this was enough for my poor heart, so I finished the bidding with slam in hearts.  All up, there are 40 honour points so as far as I knew we were missing 9. In my dream I was trying to figure out where the missing 9 points should have been. This is kind of crazy, but great at the same time. Now when somebody asks me about my passion, I can say without hesitation – bridge!