I'm obsessed with playing the Powerball. My boyfriend thinks I'm sliding down a "slippery slope." He means gambling is dangerous. But I have a different perspective.
I've always thought of gambling as cute and harmless.
My dad gambles. He's cute and harmless, and he's always gambled as a hobby. Maybe he wants to win a bazillion dollars, but he never acts that way. Dad's the kind of guy who watches the daily lottery even when he doesn't buy a ticket.
I have lots of memories of Dad clenching tickets and watching TV screens on the off chance he might win thirteen dollars. Dad pretty much likes any game where you can place a two-dollar bet. But his favorite method of losing money has always been horse racing.
When I think of horse racing, I think of my dad explaining to me why "Princess Barley" was actually a boy horse's name. I was bewildered by horse races. My family went to the racetrack all the time when I was a kid, but I never fell in love with it.
Horseracing actually bored the tar out of me.
For three hours, we would sit on cement bleachers and wait. We'd wait for the horses to be led out. We'd wait for the race to start. When the race did start, it would only last forty-five seconds. But then we'd have to wait for a panel of horseracing experts to release the "official" results of the race. After all that waiting the result was always the same. The concrete seats were still hard, and Dad had lost another two bucks.
As a nine-year-old, I thought losing two dollars was stupid.
Okay, it's still stupid now that I'm thirty. The odds of me winning the Powerball is roughly the same as the odds of Prince Charles showing up at my house and asking to use my bathroom. But playing the lottery is way more fun then waiting around for Prince Charles to show up.
My new hobby is making lists of how I'll spend my Powerball money. I'd buy a house, I'd give some money to my family, and I'd buy a goat farm in Bolivia. Why Bolivia? Just because that's the way you spend your money when you have a bazillion dollars.
Some people approve of my goat-buying scheme. But not my sister.
My sister doesn't want me to win the Powerball. She says all lottery winners are miserable. She's worried for me. But I just laugh at her. I am willing to risk misery for a chance to buy my own space ship. If I had a bazillion dollars, I would definitely buy a space ship. Why? Just because rich people don't have to explain themselves.
At the beginning of this essay, I talked about my dad as a lovable gambler. Now I'll reveal the truth about my family. My mother is the real gambling fiend. You need a cupcake, a lead rope, and about three hours to get my mother out of a casino. She'll say, "I'm only going to Mountaineer because your father likes it." But the second my mother hears the whirr of a slot machine, her eyes light up with dollar signs, and she begins losing nickels at warp speed.
On one of these family trips to Mountaineer, I won two hundred and fifty dollars. It was a lovely experience. Bells went off. A gambling associate came over and counted out a stack of bills into my hand. Then I got to be generous to my jealous family members. "Here's a twenty for you," I'd say. "Here's a twenty for you. I think I'll keep a couple of fifties for me."
The problem with winning is you think you are going to keep winning. The last time I gambled on slot machines, I lost fifty dollars in the first half hour and spent the next four hours chasing my mother around the casino with a cupcake. "Can we go home now? Please? I'll give you this cupcake."
But my mother's example does not frighten me. I am going to win the Powerball… someday. And then I'm going to buy Mount Rushmore. Why? Just because.
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