Sometime recently, I think I remember talking about the gift of gab, and my appreciation for the art of persuasion and rhetoric. To me, it’s a valuable art form that has a whole web of connected associated skills – it can help form you into a greater conversationalist, listener, or storyteller, it forces you to reflect on what something you will say can or will affect who you’re saying it to and thus affect your deliberate decision making, and so much more.

Here’s a quick story about a time where that network of skills laid a total egg and got me nowhere.

It was summer time in 2019, and for the last week I’d been on my hands and knees redoing the floors in my mother’s house as part of its renovation, all by myself. My wrists were sore, my knees were sore, as were my back, my neck, my shoulders and my goddamn will to live, but I’d gotten it done. And now it was Saturday, and I’d gone to a casino one town over to sit my ass down, have a beer, and watch a UFC event at their sports bar.

Weird thing about me: I like getting carded. I think it started when I was maybe twenty-two at a grocery store, and the clerk doing the bagging called me “sir.” When I get called “sir” or give my ID at a bar, I feel like a high-ranking government agent giving my clearance code to a classified sector or something.

Overblown, but how I feel.

Now, I had never been carded before going onto the gambling floor at this particular casino, but this time as I approach to make my way to the sports bar that is my destination, security fella by the name of Brandon, as I would come to find out, welcomes us and asks for our ID’s.

Here’s the rub. My driver’s license had expired, like, a week before this. But with the aforementioned renovating and back-breaking floor work, I hadn’t had the time or emotional fortitude to make it to the DMV yet. I don’t think it matters, but I know how the world can be. And sure enough, Brandon sucks in air through his teeth as he looks my card over and goes, “Ah, hey. Your ID’s expired.”

I play it off pretty aloofly and explain my situation with the floors and the DMV and broken spirit and such, and the whole time he’s nodding, knowingly and smiling sympathetically.

“I get it, man. But it’s still expired, and technically I can’t let you on the floor without a valid government ID.”

I laugh, pretty warmly I think. “Hang on. So, two weeks ago, I’m certifiably twenty-six years old. But now, half a month later, we just don’t know if I’m of age?”

He laughs with me and holds his hands up. “I get it, but dude it’s my job. I can’t. I’m sorry.” He laughs again. “Like, really. I am. But they’re the rules.”

“They’re dumb ones,” I chuckle.

“I agree,” he nods.

“Tell you what, man, I don’t- I’m sorry, by the way, Evan.” I hold out my hand to shake like I’m finally introducing myself, which he does and tells me his name is Brandon. “Hey Brandon. Dude, my back is f***in’ mush. I’m not here to gamble, I’m not here to even drink, I just want to put my flat, tired ass in a chair to watch the fights. Here.” I dig my wallet out of my pocket and hold it out to him. “Brother, please even, hold onto this as collateral if you have to. My butt,” I point to it, “just wants that chair,” I point to one maybe six feet behind him, “for the next two, trouble-free hours. Can you level with this broke-ass, tired-ass, tryin’-to-be-a-good-son-to-his-mother-ass bitch and let me have a seat? You can hold onto my wallet and watch me, hands on the table the whole time. That cool?”

He smiles and laughs with me the whole time, and by the end of my diatribe- well, he hasn’t exactly been won over, but he does level with me.

“Listen,” he says, “I really can’t let you through. I really could lose my job.” He takes a big breath. “But what I will say is that I go on my break in about ten minutes, and I’ll be walking away from my place here. And, like, from there, whatever happens happens, y’know?”
“You a real cool motherf**ker, Brandon,” I tell him. “Thank you.”

Now, of course, it doesn’t work. Like, it sounds nice in a conspiratorial sort of way on paper, but naturally as soon as he walked away his replacement fills his place like clockwork without room for me to slip past. So, I shrug, and start trying to work my magic on this guy.

No dice. And I throw the whole book at him: “Helping my mom,” “Ow, my back,” “Certifiably twenty-six,” “Here, take my wallet.” Everything. But Brandon must have turned his radio on while I was talking with him or something, because this dude (David, I think) just laughs and shakes his head the whole time like it’s a story he’s heard before – which he probably has, to be fair.

Well, shit. If my plan for the evening isn’t going the way I’d hoped, I’m gonna make some lemonade out of these achy, sore-ass lemons.

“So, hypothetically,” I say to David eventually after a long pause and my book of tricks has long-since failed, “if I tried to just, like, run past you, you’d probably have to stop me, huh?”

He laughs pretty good at that one, but nods his head. “Yeah, probably would,” he says.

“Would you tackle me, or, like, would you be nice about it?”

“Depends, probably.”

“Easiest just to tackle, huh?”

“Kinda, yeah.”
“Shoot.” Another long pause stretches between us, and he checks some other peoples APPARENTLY VALID ID’s in the meantime. “What if I just took that chair,” I point to the one I did earlier with Brandon, “and brought it out here?”

“Nah. Can’t let you do that either.”

“Hmm. Against the rules too?”

“Yep.”

“Fire hazard or something?”

“Yep.”

“Mm, sure. Well…shit.”

Now, I feel like I should mention that at the top of this when I said Brandon “welcomes us and asked for our ID’s,” it’s because Amanda’s been next to me during ALL of these shenanigans. While I’ve been finding it amusing, she has rightly hated the whole wasted encounter. And believe me, I tried using her as a bargaining chip more than once, like if she could be my chaperon or if I could just use the validity of her ID in the same way spouses share an insurance plan.

Shockingly, neither of those worked either.

My last gambit was to just lean against the railing and watch the screens from afar, since I was tall enough to do so without technically having my feet over the line of the gambling floor. I’d even joked with David about what he’d do if I stepped over the line to lean less far, to which he said he’d have to stop me.

Well, I’ll tell you one thing, after jabbering his ear off for the better part of half an hour, I did inch a couple toes over the line the lean more comfortably and he didn’t say a damn thing.

Boom. That’s the power of persuasion.