My fingers wrestled with the fitted sheet, a futile battle against elastic and expectation. It was a Tuesday, early morning, about 6:02, and here I was, trapped in a domestic skirmish. You’d think after 22 years of this particular chore, some semblance of mastery would emerge. Instead, each attempt to fold it into a neat, manageable square resulted in a lumpy, rebellious orb. The frustration wasn’t just about the sheet; it was about the insidious demand for perfection that creeps into every corner of our lives, especially our creative ones. We look at the finished product, the pristine image on Instagram, the flawlessly rendered art piece, and we internalize the lie that the process to get there was equally smooth, equally contained.

That’s the core frustration, isn’t it? The belief that if we’re truly good, truly expert, our journey should be linear, without a single wrinkle, without an awkward bulge. We’re taught to hide the struggle, to present only the polished outcome. This expectation doesn’t just make us feel inadequate when our own work is inevitably messy; it actively stifles the very impulse to create. Who wants to begin if the first 22 steps are bound to be clumsy, imperfect, and far from the imagined ideal? We anticipate the critique, the judgment, not just from others, but from the most brutal critic of all: ourselves. We convince ourselves that if it’s not perfect, it’s not worth sharing, not worth even trying.

The familiar weight of change in a pocket, or more accurately, the sudden lightness after a transaction, is rarely pondered beyond the immediate exchange. But there’s a specific kind of emptiness that gnaws, isn’t there? Not the kind you feel after buying groceries, knowing you’ve gained sustenance. It’s the one that follows when you’ve “lost” something intangible, like an hour, or fifty-seven dollars, perhaps. I’m talking about the subtle shift in perception between paying $15 for a movie ticket, knowing full well you’ll leave with just a memory, and losing that same $15 over an hour playing a game. The first often feels like a good night out, a memory purchased, a story consumed. The second? For many, it’s a sting, a failure, a question mark hanging over the entire engagement. A sense of “what was the point?” Why the stark difference in how we process these remarkably similar experiences of consuming entertainment, both designed to elicit a specific emotional response?

It boils down to expectation, doesn’t it? We’ve been conditioned to believe that money spent should yield a tangible return, or at least a clear “win” in a quantifiable sense. This ingrained mindset makes “losing small amounts” feel like a bug in the system, a flaw to be avoided, rather than what it truly is: a core feature of a well-designed entertainment experience. It’s a fee, not a flaw. A small, predictable cost for the immersive joy of managed

The felt is a universe of contained violence. Cards snap, chips clatter with that specific plastic-clay thud, and the air conditioning hums a steady, indifferent note against it all. Over at table nine, a man in a wrinkled linen shirt is on a heater. He’s up, by my count, at least $979. He should be ecstatic. He’s not. His shoulders are hitched up to his ears, and every time he wins a hand, his jaw tightens, as if the victory is a personal insult. His tip on a $239 pot? A single, resentful dollar chip flicked with the same energy someone might use to squash a bug. It skitters across the felt and stops just short of the line. An afterthought. An annoyance.

Two tables down, a woman is getting absolutely crushed. She hasn’t won a meaningful hand in forty-nine minutes. She’s laughing. Actually laughing. When the river card gives me a boat and sinks her flush, she smiles, shakes her head, and slides a crisp twenty toward me.

The Meritocracy Myth

We are told a lie, from the first day we stand behind a table, serve a drink, or carry a plate. The lie is that your income, the part that relies on the kindness of strangers, is a reward for good service. It’s a