My wife and I were blessed when our son and his fiancé visited during the holidays. They’re wonderful people who have made a great life for themselves in Colorado. And it was fun to hear about how they’ve entered a contest to win the “Dream Home,” a beautiful Colorado house being given away by the HGTV network. My wife and I were only mildly disappointed when they told us that, should they win, they plan to sell their condo and move to this “Dream Home” rather than give it to us. Oh, well. It’s not like we had curtains picked out yet.
I generally don’t enter luck-based contests. I’ve never bought a lottery ticket, for example, but I’ve certainly witnessed the phenomenon. I’ve stood in countless lines with countless other working stiffs at countless convenience stores on countess mornings to buy another countess caffeinated beverage while countless people rob countless moments of our lives buying countless varieties of lottery tickets. Congressional Republicans can choose a Speaker of the House faster than some people can purchase their morning array of lottery tickets.
Honestly, I can empathize with the ticket scratchers as their scratch tickets amount to, once again, less than scratch. Four decades dominated by “trickle-down” policies have left too many people with the idea that a game of chance is a viable path to financial security. I just wish that more people would use the money spent on lottery tickets for affordable tuition at community colleges like the one where I teach. They could have earned countless credentials, certificates, and degrees. Well, not “countless.” But just one credential, certificate, or degree would pay off far better than those castaway lottery tickets left crumpled in countless trash barrels.
Relying too heavily on the lottery mythology can leave some players deeply misguided. Many years ago, a friend told me he bought lottery tickets every morning as “an investment.” He told me that the more he played, the more his chance of winning would improve. He called it, “The Law of Averages.” He was convinced that he would one day win because he was using up his losing tries as he moved toward that inevitable win. I told him that if his odds of winning five years ago were, say, one in a million, those odds were still one in a million now, no matter how many tickets he had purchased in the meantime. “Nope,” he said, firm in his resolve. “It’s science. I’m increasing my odds each day.” He even promised to give me a cut when he won.
I lost touch with this friend long ago, and, thus far, he hasn’t reached out with news of a big win and a request for account information to wire my share. I’m no stranger to offering my treasure with no chance of immediate enrichment as an investment in the future. After all, I invest significant time into writing this monthly column for free. (Yes, my friends, Gazette columnists aren’t paid. I got a chuckle when I heard a critic once tell me, “Whatever they’re paying you, it’s too much!”)
But my free labor in writing this column helps me find interested readers who may want to purchase the pieces of my writing that actually are for sale. Please see the website listed at the end of this piece to discover more information about sending me currency in exchange for concrete and virtual artifacts composed of my compositions. (Autographed copies are available upon request. Next year’s holidays will be here before you know it!) I may not sell enough books to quit my day job teaching night classes, but the investment is worth it. Buying lottery tickets, by contrast, won’t make you lose hundreds of billions as that “genius” Elon Musk has done, but the return on investment for lottery tickets is so close to zero that it might as well be measured in Bankman-Fried units of cryptocurrency.
Casinos strike me as similar to playing the lottery. Sure, casinos are fun, with lights and sounds and cheap drinks. But there might as well be rows of toilets instead of slot machines to go with the entertainment. People could drop their bills in the bowl, flush, and watch their money spin ‘round and ‘round before disappearing. Yes, on some rare occasions, the septic system might back up, and someone might win a splash of dirty money. But the house owns the plumbing and knows how to keep the pipes flowing to its own pockets.
That brings me to the best investment lottery I’ve ever played. For many years, my wife and I have taken all the money we could have used for casino trips or lottery tickets and, instead, sent it to our local bank’s mortgage department. Guess what? Not long ago, when we finished paying off our mortgage, we had the wonderful luck of winning a house! It’s the same one we’ve been blessed to live in all along, every bit our “dream home” even if it’s not HGTV-level fancy. Every moment we spend in that house is a reminder of how lucky we are. I wish that same good fortune for everyone in 2023. May it be a lucky year for us all!
John Sheirer is an author and teacher from Florence. His latest book is the award-winning, “Stumbling Through Adulthood: Linked Stories.” Find him at JohnSheirer.com.