not a winner

I once asked my sister what she’d been doing and she said “We were just sitting on the couch and talking about what we’re going to do with all the money when we win the lottery.”

What is it that some folks call the lottery? Oh that's right, 'A tax for people who are bad at math'. I’ve always been the type to put my energies into things more concrete. Hoping and waiting for something to happen by luck or chance? I dunno. But honestly, even as I write this, I suppose the alternative is just as unacceptable. A resignation that nothing good will ever happen, so why try. A person’s gotta keep hope alive somehow. Even if it is a one in ten billion shot at a new life.

I’ve purchased four, maybe five lottery tickets. I thumb-tacked the suckers to my bulletin board and considered the winnings. But when I began imagining friends and family members screaming and throwing their arms around me as they accepted my gifts of money, cars and trips around the world, I stopped myself and shuddered. Why? Because after all the imagined houses, yachts, cars and vacations, one is required to return to reality. Next stop - the hand you were dealt! You rarely make the trip to ‘I won the lottery land’ and back feeling refreshed and electrified about your current situation. There is usually a bit of melancholy, maybe even regret that comes with the deal. Some will disagree with me. That's just how I feel about it.

What’s the adage about everyone needing something to love, something to do, something to look forward to? I suppose we can all reach a place in our lives, when we could come close to exhausting our cache of dreams. When we might lose the belief that we can make great things happen for ourselves. That’s probably when people start partying a little harder, stop taking care of themselves. Maybe that’s when some people start buying too many lottery tickets.

So this week, Mega Millions lottery is up to something like $290 zillion. I was sitting here feeling as though I was missing out on something. (Sidebar: the way I felt the entire time I lived in New York City) So, when I stopped at the nearby FastMart to buy some Propel, I considered purchasing a ticket. Standing next to me in line was a man who looked startlingly like Santa Claus with a full-blown crack addiction. He was about eighty-five years old and had a big grey, unkempt beard. Oh, he had a bad limp, too. I wondered if he'd been, in his early days, a professional tennis player, Olympic skier or Broadway dancer. Anyway, he was standing behind me holding a crinkled-up lottery ticket. It got me thinking about what my life will be when I am his age. Perhaps I’ll teach aqua-aerobics at a retirement village in Sun City, wearing tight fitting Lacoste T-shirts and Hagar expando-matic pants. You know, like Jack Lalanne? Or, maybe I’ll live in a small, basement apartment in West Seattle, living on my savings, making daily trips to the Quickie mart for cigarettes, The Auto Times, bottles of Jeppson's Malört and, of course, my weekly lottery ticket.

The line moved and the old man reached his arm past me, sliding his lottery ticket into the a little machine that automatically reads it.

Too quickly, the words “NOT A WINNER” appeared on the tiny screen.

I looked at the screen, then at him. He looked at me and shrugged as if to say ‘Hey, not like I didn’t know’.

I paid for my juice, walked out to my car, and noticed the man hobble out of the store. He stopped to light a cigarette, then limped over and climbed into a beige Chevy Impala with silver duct tape on the driver’s side window.

I watched him drive away, then I walked back into the store and bought two lottery tickets. I'm not sure why.