Three hundred million dollars out the window. Story of my life.
Every word in this sad, little tale is true. Honest to God.
It started on Sunday when I reluctantly bought a Powerball ticket. All right, I am a lottery moron. The lottery has been called “a tax on the stupid” and I plead guilty. I am well aware of the odds on Powerball, but still, you never know.
Someone has to win. I packed my $300 million ticket away in my pocket, carefully. I even folded it over.
A few days later, the Camden skies opened up and it rained on a “Build The Ark” level. The heavy rain flooded both sides of Cobb Road and then held a meeting in the middle of the street. The culvert was roaring, but the water level got higher and higher, reaching for my cellar door. Like any good property owner, I strolled out in my boots to survey the situation, like I could do anything about it.
While I was standing there, Mr. Idiot drove by in his white pickup truck. Did he stop for the flooded road? He did not. He slammed through as fast as he could go. The tidal wave did little damage since I was dressed in my best and roughest L.L. Bean raincoat. But Mr. Idiot’s tsunami caught the bottom of my L L. Bean (naturally) shorts. I swore all the swears I knew and prayed for a very early death for Mr. Idiot. I went back to Cobb Manor to shed the raincoat and empty my pockets.
You can guess what happened. My $300 million “Ticket to Ride” ticket was drenched. I dropped it on the coffee table, folded over, to dry out. Big mistake. What’s new?
On Thursday morning, with visions of farms in Ireland and castles in southern France dancing in my demented head, I sat down to check the Powerball numbers. I was going to pay off Jefferson Phil’s mortgage. I was going to pay all tuition costs for all nieces. I found the winning numbers, but I could not get my numbers. The ticket was folded over, dried and stuck together like I used Gorilla Glue. I used all my swears again. I took my best Tom Anderson knife (Stars and Bars design) and started operating. I could get the blade between the folds, but the details were being obliterated.
Help!
There was only one thing to do to get that $300 million. I called Blue Eyes, who is smarter than the average human person. She could hear the tears in my voice and calmly advised me to bring the lottery ticket to her house. Naturally, I did. She tried a sharp knife, too. No luck. She started steaming it, like in the old movies. While I was considering suicide, it was reported that some (expletive deleted) in Three Rivers, Michigan, had the sole winning number. For your information, Three Rivers is just 30 miles south of Kalamazoo, in case you want to send a drone. My swears were now equally divided between that lottery ticket and that (expletive deleted) in Three Rivers, Michigan.
For your records, the winning numbers were 21, 39, 40, 55, and 59 with the Powerball of 17. That Three Rivers person was going to get $191.4 million after taxes if the “lump sum” option was chosen.
That was my money.
I realized that the $191.4 million was gone, but there was still the possibility of a dinky million-dollar prize, if I could just get my numbers. Each year an estimated $2 billion goes unclaimed, including hundreds of prizes worth $1 million or more, according to data collected by the app Lottolotto. I was determined not to join those unclaimed losers. I had a brilliant idea. Hey, it happens.
I took my best flashlight (Ultrafire XML-T6) and shined it through the damned folded-over lottery ticket. I could finally see my numbers. You won’t be surprised, but not one of my numbers matched the Three Rivers numbers. Cancel that castle in southern France. Cancel that farm in Ireland. Let Jefferson Phil pay off his own mortgage. The nieces are on their own.
Story of my life.
Emmet Meara lives in Camden in blissful retirement after working as a reporter for the BDN in Rockland for 30 years.