Saturday, February 15, 2025

From My Front Porch

How would you spend your lottery winnings?

Posted

This past week I stopped at my local convenience store to purchase a lottery ticket. I am not a regular lottery game player, but every now and then the urge comes over me to invest a couple of dollars into the relatively harmless pursuit of millions of dollars of prize money. There is no real expectation of my lottery ticket defying the one in 10 million odds and actually winning the grand prize, but I do get some amusement from playing. I confess it allows me to let my mind wonder, imagining what it would be like to win $200 or $300 million dollars. Some interesting images come to mind concerning what I would do with the money and how it would change my life.

I would speculate that, since the beginning of mankind, most all people have had a daydream about instantly becoming wealthy beyond their wildest dreams. It is an escape from the reality of their day-to-day life. Probably the most common thoughts are of buying assets. The usual imagined purchases would be cars, boats, jewelry, real estate, airplanes, and travel experiences. Some might even think about sharing their winnings with family, friends, and co-workers. There are those who would set up foundations to aid the poor, the uneducated, and the less fortunate.

Sadly, I speculate there would be some winners who would drop everything and spend money as fast as they could on pleasures, which have heretofore been kept from them by their economic limitations. For these folks, family would not be important, neither would community, or friends: Only things.

My fantasy about winning lies in a very deep place inside me. Pretty sure I would not buy a Rolex, a Lamborghini, or a diamond stick pin. Upon winning and paying the required taxes, I would have the money to do so, but my heart long ago stopped craving the ownership of things. I have found that items do not give you your health, joy, or emotional wellbeing. In fact, quite the opposite is often the case.

So, what would I do? Of course, I would see that my wife, the kids, and grandkids were financially secure for generations, but I would also structure their security in such a way where they still needed to work and give the world something of themselves. I would hate to deprive them of the joy of accomplishing, of working and producing something with their life, and the satisfaction of serving others.

I know life doesn’t work this way, but if I could spend the money to go back in time, I would be a little kinder to those who needed kindness and more helpful to those who needed a helping hand. I would pull old friends close that I have let slip away, and I would have recorded every moment I had with dear Grandfather and old hound, Shadow, so I could live them all again. I would change my friend Miss Jayne’s age from 93 to 25, so she could sing, play the piano, teach and do all the things she can no longer do.

I would invest in my community and make sure that my financial excess served the place where I live long after I am dead and buried. It might be a foundation that helps the needy, a building where the arts and entertainment can thrive and flourish, or perhaps a park or two so the community can share its beauty with all of its citizens.

I must confess there are some selfish things I would do. I would take a couple of long road trips. There would be no hurry to get anywhere or to get back home to some work task or obligation. I might stop at a coffee shop in a little farm town like Lancaster, Missouri and enjoy a piece of pie while talking with some old farmers about how the corn and bean crop looks. Or, I might stop at some stream in New Mexico and fish for trout where I can see the mountains on the horizon. I might even take off to Vermont and Maine, just to see the colors change on the leaves of the trees come autumn.

I think the best thing about winning would be seeing the look on my wife’s face. She plays the lottery regularly, is notoriously competitive and lucky, and while she would be happy that I won, it would really aggravate her to know that I won, and she didn’t. As ornery as I am, that might be the best reward of all.

What would you do ... ?

Thought for the day: Don’t go spending money you haven’t earned on things you don’t need in the first place. It is like a dog chasing a car; once you catch it, you have to justify why you ever wanted it in the first place.

Until next time ... I will keep ridin’ the storm out!