The other time I didn't win the lottery

Memories beget memories, don't they? And so yesterday's blog reminded me of another father/son lottery tale. This time however I was the father and my son was in tow. It isn't quite so hilarious either. But it's still a good story.

About a month after Charlie mustered out of the Army, as we sat anticipating some waste of time on TV one night, we decided we wanted pizza. As we drove to the pizza parlor we came across dozens, maybe a hundred, small pieces of paper strewn across the street. "What are they?" Charlie wondered allowed.

"They look like lottery slips," I responded. While Michigan like many other states still has scratch offs, many lottery tickets by then were printed by computer and had bar code identification.

My son asked, "Want to pick them up?" I knew what he thinking, because I was curious about the same thing. But I said, "They've gotta be losers or they wouldn't be all over the street." Still, an overlooked small winner might pay for our food, and lottery tickets are bearer items. Maybe we might luck up...

I pulled over the van and we began collecting what were indeed lottery slips. And there were several dozen. Once gathered, we went to a nearby party store to check them out.

Fortunately, with the bar codes, we were able to check the tickets at a scanner rather than be pests to the clerk. With each scanned paper I think Charlie and I both held our breaths slightly, hoping for some bit of good news, our anticipation oddly building with every loser. Perhaps the next one would be the one! Sadly, there were no major or minor winners. Our effort was for nil.

Still, the thought that maybe we had passed up on some small windfall would have haunted me, and maybe my son, until this day. I'm glad we at least tried. And we did get all that litter off the street.