Powerball
Why?
It’s a long- and well-established fact that I’m a cheap bastard, so it sometimes surprises when I throw money away.
Yes, I buy Powerball tickets.
Because I’m a stickler for structure it’s probably less surprising that I have rules about my Powerball participation.
First, I only buy tickets when the jackpot reaches $250 million. No rationale, just that I can’t be bothered for more plebeian sums, I guess. Second, I only buy one ticket per jackpot; if it’s meant to be then it would be redundant to buy more than one. Third, I only get Quick Picks; see above about meant to be. And fourth, I always buy something, usually a can of soda, from the Kwik Stop where I buy my tickets — the owner should get something for offering me the opportunity to be a multi-millionaire.
I’ve heard all the bromides about the lottery: a tax on the stupid (or more generously, the mathematically-challenged); the odds are the same whether you buy a ticket or not; the sure way to make nothing from something. And I believe them.
So why?
Because once in a while someone wins. Why not put myself in that population?
Because you might as well flush it down the toilet.
Ah, but there’s where we part company. Because there’s a fifth rule, the most vital of all: I think about what I would do with that ungodly amount of money. Which is something I wouldn’t get if I flushed my two dollars.
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I usually do my mental wanderings while I eat lunch. I like lunch, but it can be a little boring just sitting in the sun and eating my banana, Macro Bar, and raw nuts and dried fruit. (Yes, I eat the same lunch every day — though I rotate three flavors of Macro Bars to keep the mystery alive.)
So what would I do with my imaginary winnings?
Vacations obviously.
But not just amorphous vacations. Three weeks at an inclusive resort in Montana to start. Kim and I would be there for the entire time, but we would invite her extended family to join us the first week, have my kids join hers for the second week, and then host my extended family for the third. And we’d do that every year, somewhere different each time. Quebec. New Mexico. Banff. Patagonia. Bahamas. We’d do something similar for our friends — spend a month somewhere fun and interesting and cycle our friend groups through one week at a time.
Kim wants to remodel the house — add a bathroom and another bedroom and a sun porch. Her comfort and happiness seem kind of worthwhile, so I’d do that even if it’s just rounding error on a $250 million-plus jackpot. Happy wife, happy life and all.
I’d also set up my kids and Kim’s kids and our siblings and our nieces and nephews with housing for life, probably by funding trusts to hold any titles and enough money to pay for maintenance and taxes and the like. Plus 529 plans for all grandchildren. And the best independent- and assisted-living places for our parents.
And then there’s charity. I’ve already looked up the actions that would have the greatest social impact: disease eradication and public health have by far and away the greatest returns; seed funding for innovations around climate resilience, education access, and clean air and water are also incredibly valuable; and funding self-sustaining local infrastructure, skill-building programs, and applied research offer longer-term scalable benefits too. I haven’t identified organizations that provide these actions, but that would be among the first steps once I have my grubby hands on the windfall.
And I would definitely hire staff to keep things straight. I can barely manage my own very simple finances, so I’d desperately need some support there. And a full-time assistant would allow me to continue to spend my days writing instead of managing the clamor for money. Maybe I’d add a writing studio into the remodel, although I like using the local library, so maybe not.
One thing I wouldn’t do is self-publish my fiction. I don’t begrudge those authors who do it, but if there is a market for the stories I write then I will find it in the way every other writer does: submitting stories and novel queries to publications, publishers, and agents. I don’t believe in forcing myself on anyone anyway, and besides, there are far better ways to spend $250 million-plus.
It seems like just thinking about all that possibility is worth a couple bucks.
And Saturday’s drawing is up to $674 million.
That’s a lot of vacation.
