They only offered scratch off tickets then, the kind that you instantly win (or generally lose) with, and few retailers initially had the state lottery. One Saturday night early on, Mom and Dad and us kids started playing the lottery, oh, at about 6 in the evening. We'd pony up our bucks, as the tickets were a dollar each at the time, and me Pops and me drove down to a store on Dix Road in Lincoln Park. It was eight or nine miles from home but the nearest place we knew that had lottery. He'd bring the tickets back to the house and we'd each scratch ours off. There were always enough small winners to merit going back out.
Which we did, several times. If I had to guess I'd say we made ten trips from downtown Detroit to Lincoln Park, me Pops and I, never having won more than a few dollars at a time yet enough to fuel our lottery fever. It reached the point where Dad and I had the only winners. And of course, we each won another few bucks with that. It got to where we never left the parking lot of that party store until our winnings and a little bit more were spent. I think we sat in that lot a half an hour, scratching tickets, winning a bit, going back in, then scratching those in the car. And all the while cackling like idiots at the absurdity of it. I rarely heard the old man laugh so heartily, so insanely, as that night.
Who started it I don't know. But you know how it is: laughter, especially uproarious laughter, often feeds itself. It stokes its own coals. I mean, we were both laughing harder than hell. We'd say we were done after these tickets, and then win three dollars and start again. We laughed until we hurt; laughed until we cried. It was just bizarre. Anyone walking by and noticing the two morons in the old Polara wagon had to have thought we were nuts. But for me and me Pops, it was a fun time.
So I haven't won the lottery. But it kinda felt like I did that night.
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