Who hasn’t played the lottery before? We all do it, we all
say we don’t expect to win, yet if we truly believed it, why do we spend our
hard-earned money on it? Because somewhere, deep down, we do think we’re going
to win. We watch the tv on a Saturday night (or check the numbers the next day
for those lucky enough to have a life on a Saturday night!) and still get the
slightly elevated heart-rate, tingling in your fingers whilst gripping on to
your ticket, waiting for your numbers to flash up...and then experience the
gut-wrenching disappointment when they inevitably never do. Or, very
occasionally, the overwhelming excitement of winning £10, quickly followed by the
comedown when you realise it’s still not the £1,000,000 you secretly hoped it
would be. So why do we do it?
Well, I actually know (or, should I say, knew) someone who
has won the lottery in the past few months. In fact, it was one of the biggest
wins ever in Britain at £46,000,000. And I used to be in the same class as him
at school. And possibly, even worse than that, I had recently been asked out by
his best friend, who has just received a best-friend bonus gift of over
£1,000,000. Sucks to be me! (Is it too late to get in contact do you think...?)
With another lucky winner having a large lottery influx just
before my schoolmate in the same city, my hometown started being toted in the
press as being ‘lucky’, and I began to wonder if some of this so-called ‘luck’ might
have rubbed off on me. Which has led me, for the first time in around 5 years,
to play the lottery tonight.
I decided I’d buy my tickets online (as it’s clearly too
much effort to get up and actually go out mid-day on a lazy Saturday while
watching old ER episodes back-to-back), but there was only one problem – you have
to deposit a minimum of £5 and tickets are £1 each. I assessed my laziness, and
decided to go ahead with this – I spent £2 on two tickets, and decided to spend
my remaining £3 on the instant win online games...a rocky road, I’m sure you’ll
agree.
However, I was amazed (or, deep down, was I half
expecting/hoping for it?) to find that I began winning – very small sums, a £1
here, £2 there...until the big one. £5! Now, I had a dilemma – at £6 left in my
online lottery funds, do I pay the money back into my account, or keep playing?
Thankfully I did the sensible thing (bearing in mind, I am a graduate on a
less-than-graduate salary) – I drew my £5 back out (effectively getting tonight’s
tickets for free) and would play with the last remaining £1. I was sure to win,
wasn’t I? I’d been on such a winning streak so far...
I didn’t win. And then I felt it – the mild disappointment,
the small hole of emptiness of knowing that my chances of winning the big money
had vanished and, more scarily, the desire to transfer more money in my attempt
to win. At that point, I closed the site down, and hid my purse from myself
until the sensations subsided, vowing to giving the gambling a break for a
while.
Until tonight, of course, where I still have my two lottery
tickets. And, failing to find myself a life this Saturday night, I’ll be there,
in front of the tv, waiting and secretly half-expecting to see my numbers flash
across the screen. Will I win? I doubt it. But there’s still that hidden part
of me, deep down, that isn’t quite so sure...
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