Ann Kuperberg
Christmas is coming and many of us will not be sharing the holiday with family and friends.
Next year will be better, with a vaccine available, and a safer time to travel.
However, we don’t have to mope with good duplicate bridge games online every hour of the day. If we can’t sleep, we can play online with a robot or ask for a partner. American Contract Bridge League (ACBL) games provide an assortment of players from all over the world—a challenge to defend against those who open a 4-card major other bid not usually played.
Tucson clubs provide daily virtual games at different skill levels and offer online classes, too. The Adobe & Northwest clubs have combined with other clubs so there’s a wider field of players.
Michael Berkowitz had an interesting article in Bridge Bulletin.
“There are two phases in your bridge-playing career. In the first phase, you’ll finish playing a hand and have no memory of the cards that were played. You’re enjoying yourself and don’t know whether the play was good or bad,” he wrote. “Some players never move past this stage.” Michael then adds that bridge becomes a passion “the first time you recognize your own mistake.”
We try to learn from our mistakes and not make them again, and we’ll make other mistakes, but that’s okay. Bridge stimulates our minds and keeps us actively engaged.
So, while we’re not waiting for Santa to arrive, we can still enjoy the holidays by keeping healthy and continuing to play bridge online. Ho, ho, ho.