Foolish dreams

All right, I admit it. This isn't easy for me. But then again, admitting weakness never is. Even though I have seemed to made it a bit of a habit recently by airing certain things through my writing here on Facebook. But sometimes the truth shines its harsh glare in places we would rather keep it from. 

Many of you won't blame me. In fact many of you have done the same. I am sure of it. But last night I simply could not resist. The temptation was powerful and overwhelming. I was caught up in the enthralling combination of hopes, dreams and maybe a little bit of good old-fashioned greed. Yes. It's true. 

If you would have happened to wander into the Jenison Speedway about 9:40 last night, you would have seen my buying...ok, here it goes...don't hate me now...and don't judge. I did indeed buy a lottery ticket last night. 

It feels so good to get that out there. It didn't feel so good to realize this morning that I seem to have no talent at buying lottery tickets. I do feel the need to clarify a bit. I have bought a few scratch and sniff tickets in the past. Oh wait, you aren't supposed to sniff them? That explains why they always smelled so disappointing. That's really not that bad of an idea. They should make losing tickets scented, you know, to ease the pain of failure. 

Dang it! I just threw away $2, but at least I have the fresh smell of strawberries to ease my pain. 

I have very infrequently bought instant win tickets. Once I won $20 and decided to call it quits so that I could claim that I didn't lose money buying tickets. There is a certain joy in "beating the system", and by George, I did it. (Who is George by the way and why do we say that? Oh. You don't. Well la de freakin' la to you) 

Face it though, instant wins are like the marijuana of the lottery game. MegaMillions is the heroin. And I have stayed away, until last night. But last night daddy needed a hit! I mean, seriously. The prize was 359 million dollars. That's MILLION with a capital M and a lot of illions. And I wanted to win. 

I heard it on the radio earlier in the day. Yeah, I know. You have a better chance of getting struck by lightning while being attacked by a bear while being shown compassion from a Republican than winning the lottery. I resisted the temptation on the way home. I was strong. But then...

How many spirals into the abyss have started with the words, "but then"? There I was, innocently playing Words with Friends, and it hit me like an epiphany, the cut off time for the sale of tickets was at 10:45. It was 9:15. Was I really going to do this? 

Some of you may not understand my struggle. For one, my father is not a fan of the lottery. What would he say? Could I hide it from him? But I felt I had to say why I was going out so late. So I kind of told my mother sotto voce that I was leaving. She smiled and suggested I buy one for the whole family. 

Get your won ticket woman!!

No, I didn't say that, but I was tempted to. You see the corruptive power of gambling???

I spoke softly, cause even though my father was in the same room, he couldn't hear me while he was watching one of the many crime shows he enjoys watching. This is also something I do not understand. The man will only watch shows involving somebody solving a violent murder or searching to buy a new house. If they ever made a show about a realtor who solves murders, he might die of happiness. Or, he would never talk to any of us again. In which case, WE would die of happiness. Just kidding!!! I love my dad. Mostly. 

My dad was raised Christian Reformed, and there are some things that stick to you more than super glue. One of those things is that "good" Christians do NOT play the lottery. Apparently it means you are not trusting God or that Satan printed the tickets or something of that nature. See, I took it just the opposite. I thought that maybe the urging I was feeling last night was possibly, could be, maybe in some small way was God, urging me to buy a ticket. 

Upon entering the store, I realized that I didn't really know how this worked. Now I have seen other people buy lottery tickets, and upon doing so prayed for the salvation of their immortal souls and then paid for my 32oz Mountain Dew. Ummm. Sugary goodness. But I digress. 

When you walk into the store to buy a lottery ticket for the first time, you should act confident, unafraid. And then wait for all the people in the store to check out first. Like I did.

Who knows? One of them might have been one of those good Christians who resisted temptation and they would have been praying for my soul."Look sir, I see you praying for my  soul, but there is really no need. I don't normally do this. If I win, I promise I'll tithe on it."

As the store emptied out I strolled up (confidently) to the young lady behind the counter. I made the little gun thing with my finger and pretended like I was shooting her while I made that little clicking noise with my tongue and said "How you doin'?" (that's lottery player behavior for those of you who don't know) Maybe that's why she pulled out the pepper spray... Not really. 

I was briefly concerned that they didn't sell that kind of lottery ticket there. So while glancing nervously over my shoulder, to make sure Jesus hadn't walked in while I was sinning, I asked her if they sold "those MegaMillion things" here. She confirmed that they did. And she pointed to a stand holding the forbidden pieces of paper for all the different kinds of self pick tickets. I approached it slowly, wary of it's evil powers. I picked up a piece of paper that said "MegaMillions" on it. 

There were lots of sections and lots and lots of numbers. I felt overwhelmed and confused. I looked around for help. The teenager had retreated behind the counter, stocking cartons of cigarettes. More sin! I was surrounded by iniquity. But undaunted, I pressed on.  I looked for somebody to help me, and thankfully there was another lottery player approaching the stand of promising sin. I would have known he was a lottery player even if I hadn't seen him walk up to the stand because he was bald and had tattoos. 

He explained to me what I had to do. It seemed  easy enough. So I sat and scribbled in the numbers I wanted like I was doing an ACT test. But if I passed THIS test I was going to be rich enough to buy the store! And tithe. I shunned the easy pick option. No computer was going to determine my fiscal windfall. That was in MY hands. Having finished filling out my ticket, I waived a few more people through first and presented my ticket. She ran it through the machine and asked me to pay. I pulled out my debit card and swiped it. 

"Uh, sir, we can only accept cash for lottery tickets."

"Huh?"

"Sorry."

I had $2 in my wallet. I was kind of hoping my fellow sinner would offer to pay the remainder, but alas he was not a giving delinquent. This forced the teenager to cancel the transaction and punch in my two tickets by hand. Thus prolonging the experience while the lottery professional had to wait. 

Finally, I had my 2 tickets, my paper pick em sheet and drove home. You may judge me, but that is a lot of money! I was very surprised to find I had a hard time getting to sleep. I had resolved not to check my numbers until the morning, thinking that somehow this would improve my chance of winning the coveted prize. I could envision the press conference where some guy handed me the check. Or maybe I would want to stay anonymous. Nah.

But wait! What if one of the numbers I picked but didn't pay for won???? I should have just pulled the cash from the in store ATM and bought all five!!! I was going to possibly throw $360 million away cause I didn't want to pay the $3.50 fee for using another banks ATM? I love being dutch sometimes. I calmed myself by realizing that if it was meant to be it was meant to be. But if one of my non-paid for numbers won, maybe they would have a record of it or maybe I could cut a deal with the store...

Alas. I woke up and eagerly checked my numbers. My losing numbers. Stupid. C'mon, I knew I wasn't going to win anyway. But if I did, I would have had enough to make all my Facebook friends millionairess!! Hmm. I have over 700 friends. Nope. I guess not. I would have had enough to make my favorite Facebook friends millionairess!! And to tithe of course. 

Oh yeah, I got the $2 from an instant win ticket I cashed in that same night...

What a stupid system, the lottery. A waste of time. I have no chance of winning. Wait, you say the jackpot is now 500 million dollars? In that case, see you at the Speedway.