Twenty years ago, I experienced a lesson in life worth retelling.
After a great day of wagering at Monmouth Park, I was on the train back to Manhattan, pondering what to do with the winnings. A personal rule insists that after you experience a score, you’ve got to reward yourself afterwards. For all the blood, sweat and tears you put into handicapping, it’s necessary to let out a notch and celebrate when the time is right. You’ve got to splurge! But in this case, how?
My first option simply was having a great dinner at one of Manhattan’s finer restaurants. But that seemed too ordinary and nothing close to the special experience I was seeking.
My second option came from the ads in the New York Times Arts section. I could get a ticket to see Raquel Welch starring in WOMAN OF THE YEAR, one of Broadway’s biggest hits at the time. I’ve always liked Raquel. And while her over-acting over-projecting style worked to her disadvantage in movies, Broadway discovered that same style was better suited to live musical theatre.
But as the train made it’s way towards Penn Station and stopped in Newark, a third option popped into my head. A crowd of rowdy passengers, many with painted faces and New York Rangers hockey jerseys, rushed into the train. Where were they going? It didn’t take long to realize the answer. Above Penn Station, the train’s final destination, was Madison Square Garden, where the New York Rangers were playing the Vancouver Canucks that night in the 1994 Stanley Cup finals! This was epic! The Rangers hadn’t won the Stanley Cup in 54 years! It quickly became clear that THIS was the proper splurge. I had to see the game live, either through proper box office channels or even via ticket scalpers. Remember, I was in “full splurge” mode, mentally prepared to overpay if I had to.
Buying a ticket turned out to be easy. As the train pulled into Penn Station, a horde of ticket scalpers were there, waving their wares to passengers exiting the train. One of them approached me with his offerings and, after a few minutes of negotiation and deliberation, I bought a great seat at center ice for $300. [Using the rule that prices double every 10 years and this was 20 years ago, I’d guess that ticket would be $1,200 today.]
This was going to be great! The game was starting soon, so I made my way upstairs to The Garden. However, when I gave my ticket to the ticket taker to get in, a beep sounded from his electronic scanner and he stopped me cold. “This ticket’s no good. It’s counterfeit” he said without emotion. I tried protesting, but it soon dawned on me I had been had. Ugh. That sinking feeling. I rushed back down to the train station, hoping to confront the creep that sold me the “ticket.” But he was gone.
Afterwards, friends soothed my ire by telling me the incident was, in the grand scheme of life, a serious lesson learned cheaply. But I must admit, as the 20th anniversary of that day approaches, every now and then I think of the scalper who sold me that counterfeit ticket. And he’s laughing in the hills.
John Chance
