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[Talking Poker]

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Tom, who has lost more than $100,000 (and is currently down $55,000) since his senior year in high school, has a ritual. He plays alone in the bedroom of his off-campus apartment. The lights are off. The door is locked. He does not eat, does not answer the phone, does not even go to the bathroom. He plays one song, Such Great Heights by the Postal Service, over and over. And he loses. "Ridiculous amounts," he says. "I'll gamble $400 a day, play 12 hours a day."
For Tom, hold 'em is a symptom, not the disease. He once lost $600 in one afternoon playing H-O-R-S-E. He lost $1,500 the very first weekend he signed up at Paradisepoker.com, a site from which he is now banned. He even lost $500 one day at OTB (Off Track Betting), "and I don't even know anything about horses. I just need to gamble."

"I'm compulsively addicted to making money," Tom says without a trace of irony. "That's where it all stems from."

But where has it all led? His credit rating shot, Tom cannot even open a checking account. He is maxed out, not only on his own plastic but also on five credit cards belonging to two "investors" in his ticket-scalping business. "I'm not taking their calls," he says, "because I can't pay off their cards.

"The hardest part?" he adds. "I'm always scared, always depressed and sad. I ruined my life. I messed up my life, my academics, my friendships. Just don't gamble. Don't do it."