Historical May 1989 report or notice. Original dates, prices and contacts describe the source period; current availability has not been established.
I was a lot richer not too long ago.
Not a little bit richer; no, a whole lot richer.
For a day, you see, I was worth over $66,000,000! That’s right: sixty-six million U.S. dollars.
It was a great day.
It was a day full of dreams, plans, and ideas.
It ended that night when I turned on the tube and carefully wrote down the winning digits.
They weren’t mine.
I was back to where I started that morning, minus the $66,000,000 I had won and the $20 I spent on the lottery tickets. Jimmy Carter was right about one thing: life just isn’t fair. I used to think that the lottery was a waste of time, a statistical improbability that only poor and foolish folks played. I can remember my first wife saying, “Why not just use your dollar bills to light your cigars? It’s the same as buying a lottery ticket, but you don’t have to wait to see the result:’ Ah, the first wife simply had no sense of the larger picture. Yes, I know that buying a lottery ticket is foolish. Yes, I know that I probably won’t win. Yes, I know that I could take those same dollars and put them in a savings account or even a piggy bank and come out better than buying lottery tickets. Yes, I know that the Missouri lottery revenue doesn’t even go to education.
And what effect does all of this knowledge have on me, you ask? “Now please, can I have $5 worth of lottery tickets, and in a hurry? I’m late for school:’ I say each Friday morning after breakfast at the West End Cafe.
While logically I know that I’m not going to win the lottery, I also logically know that it’s the best shot at having millions of bucks that I’ll ever have.
The South St. Louis housewife, North County cab driver, Hannibal grocery clerk, polyester suburbanite, and outstate farmer and I have that in common. Last week I had it in common with millions of residents of the Land of Lincoln and countless—truly—others who came in to Illinois just to buy lottery tickets. Did we know we’d win? Of course not. Did we hope we’d win? You betchum!
If we didn’t win the lottery are we likely to be worth millions through any other legal means?
No way, Jose.
It started Saturday morning at breakfast, the day when the winning numbers were to be drawn.
The first wife and I were staying at a Chicago hotel and the dining room was abuzz with people talking about the Illinois state lottery.
The Chicago paper had a headline noting that the winning pool was over sixty million, and still counting! I bolted down my Hostess Twinkie and coffee and sprinted to the local quick shop to stand in line to take my chances.
The line was about twelve people long when I joined it, and over twenty when I finished buying my tickets.
And this was at 9:00 am or so. Fame works in funny ways.
Once in London, while waiting in line to see CATS, I was interviewed by BBC and later saw myself on the telly.
I wasn’t too surprised, then, when as I came closer to the front of the line, a television crew from CNN, the cable news channel, came in to shoot the scene.
The third or fourth person in line, a small man wearing some kind of maintenance uniform, began laughing and turning around, hiding his face from the camera. “I can’t let my pastor see me:’ he said to all of us standing behind him. Several other people pulled out combs and began touching up their hair.
It took them a fairly long time to get the lighting right, and, sure enough, there I was being interviewed by CNN. I didn’t have to worry about being seen by my pastor, and my boss—the first wife—knew where I was, so I wasn’t concerned about the publicity.
When the reporter asked me what I planned to do with my winnings, I replied, “Simple, I’ll give some money to my favorite charity, the New City School, and then I’ll buy ten million dollars or so worth of Twinkees.” As I had figured, the others in line and the camera crew broke into laughter.
The rest of the day was exciting.
We went to the Museum of Natural History, the Art Institute, had a spiffy lunch, did some shopping for shoes for the first wife, and attended a play that evening. Throughout it all, though, my mind was elsewhere. Yep, I kept thinking about what I was going to do with that cool sixty-six million dollars. I kept wanting to discuss my new-found wealth with my wife. I even suggested that we immediately check into a higher-priced suite so that we’d be notified of our winnings in more appropriate opulent surroundings, but she wasn’t interested in pursuing the matter.
She also vetoed going to a bank and putting the winning ticket in a safe deposit box. “But,” I exclaimed, “that means that I’m carrying sixty-six million dollars around in my pocket!” “What to do with the sixty-six mil?” you wonder? It’s simple. I’d start by getting all of my shoes professionally shined.
After all, if I’m going to be meeting and hobnobbing with big-wigs, I’ve got to have smart looking shoes, right?
After the shoes are shined, I think I’ll subscribe to every single magazine on the Publisher’s Clearing House list. I like reading and love getting magazines. Plus with the wonderful streak of luck I’m having, I may even get a phone call from Ed McMahon telling me I’ve won another mil or two! I think I’ll then give the wife a thousand or two to buy some new clothes.
She says that she needs shoes, and she should look good if she’s going to be married to a multimillionaire. Plus, she’ll still be going to work (she’s not very good at handling free time), so I want to make sure she can wear clothes commensurate with her husband’s good fortune. I’ll also invest in a new closet renovation for the wife.
Since I’ll be home all day and sleeping late, we need to arrange the lighting so that I’m not awakened when she gets up to get dressed for work. I think I’ll also call around and get some foreign chef to come in and give her lessons on cooking and, while I’m at it, purchase a new vacuum sweeper and brand-new rags for her to use in dusting the furniture when she returns home from work. I’ll let her buy all of the shoes she wants.
She has so many that she’s named them, and I’m sure she’d like to buy a new family or two. I’ll make a huge donation to charity, have ChemLawn come to our house every day, and maybe offer to help the Cards in their free-agent bidding. I’ll buy a loge box at the new RiverFront Stadium, have lots and lots of trees planted on Delmar from Union to EastGate, help re-instate the Sociology Department at Wash. U., and purchase some more business cards for my wife. I’ll find some young energetic kids to exercise for me; they can work out on my NordicTrack and get the odometer to a reasonable level. I’ll travel, buying clothes in each new city so that luggage isn’t a problem. I’ll even ride in first class; that area that I always walk by on my way to the cattlecar! I’ll get the wife a new appointment book so that she can keep all of her business meetings organized. I’ll personally pay to get a Ted Drewes to replace the filling station at the corner.
And with the remaining sixty-plus mil? Simple, I’d buy more lottery tickets.
Well, you know the unhappy ending to this story. Someone else won the big sixtysix. I came back poorer than I had left, but richer because I had touched wealth.
For a day I was jet-setting around the world in my newly-shined shoes, while also generously making sure that the wife had a new vacuum-sweeper. What an experience! I think I’ll buy $10 worth of tickets next Friday. Does anyone know a good vacuum-sweeper salesperson???
Originally published in The Times of Skinker-DeBaliviere, May 1989.
Read this article in the original newspaper issue.
Original source: SD_Times1989_05.pdf, printed page(s) 8; PDF page(s) 9.
