Forfeiting the Game - Sept 20 2026

 

Forfeiting the Game

Sept 20 2026

I never played pinball.

But I can see the shiny ball bearing

and the flashing lights,

hear the bumpers thwap

and the music bubble

like a calliope on speed.

See the man, eyes intense

bent over the glass-topped box

with his hands gripping the sides,

working the flippers

as if he could alter fate

violate Newton’s laws,

as if their furious waggling 

catching only air

did not remind him

of his own futile striving.

Can hear the legs screech

and table shudder,

see the TILT sign light up.

As if a level playing field

was the least one should expect.

As if a lucky hit

could make up for all the misses,

the way a bad gambler

puts all his chips

on the one sure thing.

As if keeping a ball in the air

a few seconds more

could make everything right;

if not his whole life

then at least the single night

he could call himself a winner.

In short order today, I read a poem entitled Pinballing(I didn’t like it at all, and won’t bother with a link) then — hardly scrolling down — encountered an article called The Pinball President.  Seemed an odd coincidence:  I can’t remember the last time this word appeared to me in any medium. 

I’ve actually never played (believe it or not), but an image came immediately to mind. (Which may or may not be accurate.) I also thought of the intense focus of the player on this ultimately meaningless pursuit. A player who is kind of a loser — who feels powerless, thinks he’s a failure — and has nothing better to do. (Or am I a snob? Am I too judgemental, and there is nothing better?!) Thought about skill vs luck, and the difficulty discerning how much of each. Thought about nights spent searching for something more than mere distraction; and how, nevertheless, small victories are sometimes all we need when life is disappointing. (Especially an aggrieved guy who thinks it’s all rigged: that the playing field is tilted against him, and the game has been pretty much forfeit from the start.) But also how small victories can too easily substitute for the real ones that make a real difference.

It’s refreshing to picture a simple analogue game in an old fashioned arcade in this time of elaborate digital games that come with all the bells and whistles.  No connectivity, no A.I., no multiplayers, no animated screens. Just a physical object in real time and hands on.