How’d I end up here?

My parents left Northern California when I was in second grade and our family of five traveled around the United States in a 13-foot travel trailer for a year and a half, looking for a new place to live. We ended up in a small town in Montana at the base of the Rocky Mountains where graduated from high school. From there I went to the University of Montana, Missoula to study acting.

I never wanted to be an actor; I wanted to be a director. I was very much in love with stories and had not yet discovered fiction. They didn’t have an undergrad program for directing so I studied the next best thing. Then, because I was going to school for acting, I moved to Virginia City, MT, population 105, to act in summer-stock theatre.

The actors, The Virginia City Players, all lived in these little cabins down by the Sump (a great big pond) and above them, up on the hill, there was a commissary area with a kitchen and a table. One night, I went inside and found the other actors playing poker… And this changed the entire trajectory of my life.

I became obsessed. Learned everything I could about the game. Played online poker for a living for three years. Was all set. Except then, some asshole politician decided to make online poker illegal and the future I imagined evaporated overnight. With my online poker accounts locked, money in limbo, and not knowing what else to do, I got a job dealing cards in a local dive bar. A few years later, I opened my own poker room. Golden Rose Poker.

A woman came in and sat down at my table. She wasn’t a poker player. She was just trying to avoid some other people at the bar who were giving her trouble. And three years later, we got married.

I quit dealing poker after fourteen years in the industry and moved with her to Glasgow, Scotland where she attended graduate school. I couldn’t work while we were there, so I wrote a novel. When her school ended, we moved back to the United States and decided to live in Las Vegas while she searched for jobs. I figured I could get a job in the gambling industry while we waited, if it came to it, but I didn’t want to. I was done with that shit. I wanted to write books.

I put my acting degree to use, and started narrating audiobooks. We moved to Austin, Texas and she got a job in the video game industry.  Things started looking up. Then the world crumbled.

Pandemic.
A baby with colic—no more audiobooks.
Oregon to stay with family.
Back to Montana.
Then California.

And now, for the time being, we’re in Washington where I’m writing these words… Of course, there’s a lot more life left out. Some of the details here are probably a bit mixed up. Hell, I may have missed a town or city somewhere along the way. But that’s the just of it. Fate in retrospect.

I wonder where I’ll be when you read these words. I hope wherever it is, I’m writing.

Cheers,
C.J.