Ever since one of my good friends won $10,000 on a NH State Lottery scratch-ticket about 20 years ago, I have been buying a couple tickets every week.
So far, my biggest prize has been $500…which I won about 15 years ago. Since then, the lottery's prizes have become bigger and more enticing, while my winnings have become, well…practically non-existent.
I'm embarrassed to admit it, but last week, I did something really dumb while buying my scratch tickets.
Due to some rare alignment of the planets in the cosmos or whatever, I somehow managed to win $20 on a scratch-ticket, so I decided to cash it in and use half of the money to buy five assorted $2 tickets. At first, I'd considered buying ten $1 tickets, to make my scratching pleasure last longer, but the payouts on the dollar tickets weren't very enticing…like a top prize of $1,000. I wanted to win big – at least $20,000.
The supermarket where I went has a lottery-ticket machine right next to the courtesy desk. I prefer to use the machine because I can take my time studying and selecting just the right tickets. At the courtesy desk, if I stand there picking out "one of these" and "one of those," the employee usually gets this frozen smile on her face and keeps looking past me at the line of customers forming behind me, which really affects my ability to select winning tickets (not that I have any ability whatsoever to select them, but that's beside the point).
Anyway, I cashed in my $20 winning ticket and the employee handed me two $5 bills and a $10 bill. I immediately took the few steps to the ticket machine and inserted one of the $5 bills. The machine sucked it right in.
The second $5 bill, however, felt strange to me. It seemed too thick and too stiff. I held it up toward the light. It didn't have those little blue fibers running through it like authentic paper money usually has. Still, I shoved it into the machine.
The machine spit it right back out. I tried again. The bill couldn't have been rejected more quickly if it had been covered with bubonic-plague bacteria.
Frustrated, I returned to the service desk. "The machine won't accept this bill," I told the employee. "You know, it doesn't even look real to me. Does it to you?"
She barely glanced at the bill as she tossed it back into the money drawer. "It's because it has one of those big faces on it," she said. "Here – try this one. It has a smaller face."
I had no idea why the faces mattered, but I took the bill and turned back toward the machine. There, I came face to face with a woman and her little boy, who looked about six. The woman was searching through her purse for something while the boy stood staring with fascination at all of the buttons on the lottery machine.
That's when I remembered that I'd put $5 into the machine before my second bill was so rudely rejected…and the first $5 still was in there.
"Stop!" I shouted. "I have money in there!"
The woman glanced up from her purse and narrowed her eyes at me.
Almost simultaneously, the boy pressed several buttons, then shouted, "Look, Mommy! I got one!" He grabbed the ticket out of the bottom of the machine and excitedly waved it at her.
He must have thought the ticket fairy had graced him with a special gift.
I didn't want to snatch the ticket out of the hand of a mere child, but I figured he was much too young to legally be playing the lottery anyway…and I wanted to save him from a future life of crime.
"Give it to the lady," his mother told him, casting me a look that clearly told me she thought I'd purposely devised some sinister plot to destroy her child's excitement.
He handed the ticket to me…a single $5 ticket.
His mother then led him away.
I groaned. My entire five dollars had been blown on just one ticket. My plan to buy five $2 tickets had been ruined. Defeated, I decided not to even bother spending the other $5 bill…the one with the small face on it.
I hadn't been aware that the entire incident had been witnessed by a male clerk standing nearby until I noticed him smiling in amusement at me.
"I didn't even want a $5 ticket," I muttered at him. "Now I'm stuck with it."
"They say that everything happens for a reason," he said. "What if that kid accidentally got you a winning ticket? You never know – he just might turn out to be your lucky charm."
I looked more closely at the ticket. The grand prize was $100,000.
As I headed back out to my car, the clerk's words made me think. What if the little boy really had picked out a lucky ticket and I ended up winning thousands of dollars because of him? Was it possible that fate actually had intervened in a very weird way?
I dug a quarter out of my purse and, holding my breath, scratched the ticket.
I won absolutely nothing.
If everything does indeed happen for a reason, then I’m pretty sure the little boy was sent to me as my cue to stop spending money on scratch tickets.
# # #
Sally Breslin is an award-winning syndicated humor columnist who has written regularly for newspapers and magazines all of her adult life. She is the author of several novels in a variety of genres, from humor and romance to science-fiction. Contact her at: sillysally@att.net.
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