Lottery Dreams
I bought my last lottery ticket a week ago.
No more tickets to dream on.
No more nights lying awake, thinking, “If I win, what would be the first thing I would do?”
- Pay off my student loan (yes, I’m too practical)
- Buy a new bed (damn, this one is too short. My toes go right to the edge. I feel like I’m channeling Goldilocks! This one is too hard. This one is too short.)
- Move to an apartment where I can have pets (I miss having a cat)
- Go on a trip around the world (honestly, I want to experience this as it was in the early 1900s – so, unless they invent time travel anytime soon
) - Support the family’s dreams (I mostly have what I need)
- Quit my job & try to write one of the novels floating around in my cerebrum…
And this list is partly why I’ve stopped buying lottery tickets. See – too practical, mostly have what I want and the last item; that last item I could do already if I wasn’t letting fear still my voice. I could write and work at some job that I would never have to bring home, just for the money.
I’ve been buying lottery tickets for a long time, since the early 1980’s. That’s almost thirty years! Winnings that are considered common now (ten million plus) were considered rare and spectacular then. I can remember the rush to buy the first time the lotto topped ten million, by the end of the week the winnings were calculated at over double that. The lottery I played paid out a percentage of sales to the winners.
I’ve bought one ticket almost every week, two to three dollars at a time – it started out at two and went up to three somewhere along the way.
It seemed a small price to pay for the chance at a dream.
Back when it seemed like my dreams were never-ending and impossible for me to fund on my own.
Dreams like…
- Seeing a play on Broadway
- Traveling to San Francisco
- Buying raspberries & Concord grapes whenever I wanted them
- Having a new wardrobe
- Buying a big, old Victorian house
Buying a house no longer appeals. Especially a big, old Victorian – because I now know just what kind of upkeep is required to maintain one! Plus, I don’t get a tight fearful knot in my stomach anymore when I think that I will never own a house. It’s not a house I wanted, it was a home and I’ve made that for myself. All on my own with my own resources.
Home is how I feel not where I live or what I own. This feels like home. 
As stated before, I played the lottery for almost thirty years. I bet you’re wondering how much I won over that period of time. Nothing big, no big treasure chest to gloat over like Scrooge McDuck. I won $60.00 once the first year I bought tickets, I won $99.00 recently, a ten here, a ten there – a smattering of free tickets every year. Just enough to keep me playing.
Just enough to keep me dreaming and thinking that my dreams were too big for me alone to achieve.
William was the first to get me thinking otherwise. William, with his intense stare (I wrote a poem once about that stare). We went to library school together. We were classmates. I was kvetching that I didn’t have the money to go to the annual out-of-town conference. He said, “If you saved up those three dollars a week for one year, by this time next year, you’ll have enough.”
And I thought, “Yes, that’s possible. It’s possible for ME to fund my dreams.”
That was such a radical thought. I blocked it. It didn’t see possible, that I – welfare raised, poverty stricken – could choose to achieve my own dreams. Even though, here I was going back to school at thirty, living on student loans that would eventually get paid off. (They almost are paid off, after ten years of nickel and diming it).
William was the first to get me thinking that I could be financially independent but he wasn’t the last.
A recent work colleague, young, bright, good with money, inspires me to keep dreaming and planning.
And still, I didn’t stop buying lottery tickets to dream on. Even as I was dreaming less, for smaller items, for the doable.
So, why stop now? Why was the last ticket bought a week ago? September 18, 2009. Is this going to be the last lottery ticket I buy? The last lottery I never won. Am I going to stop dreaming?
That’s the plan.
I mean, “Yes, this is going to be the last lottery ticket I buy.”
And, “No, I’m not going to stop dreaming.” As I type this, I’m also planning a big trip for next April. I’m just not 100% sure of where I’m going yet.
Why did I stop buying lottery tickets?
Because, now I believe, that it is possible for me to achieve my dreams on my own. That I can earn the money I need to fund even the largest, most magnificent of dreams.
Fall
Today is a perfect Fall day. Even though, it is a tad windy. It is a brisk breeze, shaking the leaves on the trees and creating small ripples on the river. One of those crisp, clear Fall days that I love. (I am not a Summer Spinster!)
It is perfect kite flying weather – if I were still the sort to fly kites. We used to, my BB & I, we used to go to the school yard and fly kites. I could never get mine to stay up. My YHS is a genius at getting a kite to stay up and to climb higher and higher. I wonder how she does that (I should send her an email and ask). My BBHB used to fly kites too and rocket ships; I wonder if he still does. If they still take the time to go fly a kite. Today, I cannot. Today, I am working.
Photographer: Ian Britton
Once upon a time I was an Outdoor girl, walking the small town paths and country roads, collecting Cattails, talking to the local horses, building tree houses, or off reading in the park gazebo.
I remember calm mornings admiring the stillness of the lake. I prefer to spend quiet, empty Fall days at the local lakes. It was so nice when I was finally able to drive myself where I wanted to go when I wanted to go there!
The local leaves are slowly starting to change colours, losing their vibrant green for paler yellows & oranges.
We hardly ever see vibrant reds here on the prairies. I miss Montreal most in the Fall. I miss all the bright maple leaves adorning Mount Royal.
This is the brightest leaves I have seen so far this Fall.
Except for the planted ones – I have no idea what plant this is but I love the colour.
Here is a further away view – perhaps that will help in the identification.
It is Fall. There are quick changes in the temperature. It can vary from 29 degrees Celsius down to 7 or 8 degrees overnight. The leaves shiver down to their roots! I am happy. Hopefully, Winter will not come until after November 1st.
Asking For It…The Sequel
It’s hard to believe but I’ve been blogging for almost a year. My first post was September 22, 2008.
As of last week, I have posted 54 times. You would think that it was a little early for a sequel.
;-0
But, that’s what I have for today…a sequel.
I don’t know. Is it technically a sequel?
A sequel is – something that is complete in it self but continues the narrative of a previous work.
So, yes, this is a sequel.
Back on April 20, 2009 I wrote about how I have trouble asking for things, both the material and the immaterial.
That post is here!
It was basically about how I wanted blinds for my window, and even though my apartment manager had some she was willing to give me, I had trouble asking for them.
Well, as I’m sure you guessed by now, I asked and I got.
Sometime in May or June I do believe…
Then, over the long weekend in May, my landlord tried to put them up. Horrors, they were too long. And, once again, I vacillated for weeks on what to do and who could cut them for me.
Just before Father’s Day, inspiration struck. I could buy big shears and cut them myself!
I got shears for under $10.00 and set out one weekend, shortly after Father’s Day to cut them myself.
I was apprehensive. I am not a crafty person. There was much potential for disaster.
But, I gritted my teeth and gathered my tools together.
We have here the blinds (blue – hooray they match my current colour scheme), the shears, a ruler and green masking tape. The original idea was to lay out the blinds, measure them and then cut.
As you can see here, I changed my mind. I decided to just go ahead and cut and cut. And cut some more!
And cut … This was harder then it looked.
.
.
.
.
Thankfully,
the blind was plastic and not metal or something else hard to cut.
This job was turning out to be harder than initially thought.
Good thing the shears were sharp. Good thing I didn’t cut myself or the floor when I dropped them!
An hour later, and two or three trips to measure them against my window, the blinds were finished. There was only a mess to clean up. Not a big mess, thankfully. 
Just one dust pan full…
And to think this was the quickest part of getting the blinds hung. They sat on my windowsill, in my bedroom, from June until the August 1st long weekend when my landlord could find time to hang them (again).
Finally, the blinds were up. The summer sun could be blocked (kind of)
Below are my bedroom curtains. I use two cloth shower curtains, back to back. I am cheap – this was less expensive then buying real curtains. And they work just as well. And I like them. The front one is a Paris scene and the back (liner) is the night sky.
Okay, I will admit they are not the best at blocking the sun. Put they are pretty and I like how my window looks.
And isn’t that what matters most?
And I learnt how to be brave and to ask for what I need. Yeah me…
Talk Like A Pirate Day
September 18, 2009 at 9:31 pm (Book Commentary) (pirates, Talk Like A Pirate Day, women)
Ahoy me hearties,
I see through me spyglass from me lofty perch upon the crow’s nest that Saturday, September 19th be Talk Like A Pirate Day!
Now, don’t be looking at me like I’m addled (and I ain’t been in the grog either); this is one of my favourite holidays. Right after that spook and goblin one. Shiver me timbers, y’all!
Here’s a picture of a pirate ship for ye and no, the Mizzen mast ain’t missing, ye landlubber. Don’t be flying the Jolly Roger, we ain’t surrendering yet.
Ye wouldn’t even know of that blaggard Bluebeard or pompous Cap’n Hook if it weren’t for books.
Those old sea dogs don’t hold a candle to the saucy wenches that really ruled the seas. You won’t find either of them down in Davy Jones’s Locker. Don’t be disrespecting em or they’ll make ye swab the deck or walk the plank.
So, without further formality I introduce to ye two of the most notorious pirates to ever sail the seas, Anne Bonney and Mary Reade.
Now this lady, Jane Yolen, she wrote a ballad, a sea shanty about the two and this fair gentleman, David Shannon drew some pretty pictures to go along with it. It’s a mighty fair tale if ever there was one.
Tis a historical tale, set centuries ago. Port Maria bay in 1720, news from afar traveled like birdsong on the air and governors and government chased the pirates down.
Tis a pleasant ballad the fair Lady Jane has written and I won’t be spoiling the tale by telling it. Go out to ye local shoppe or free library and seek the treasure for ye self. For treasure chased is pleasanter than treasure given.
.
.
The Ballad of the Pirate Queens
By Jane Yolen & David Shannon
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt; 2001
ISBN: 978-0152018856
.
And if ye still think I’m addled cause a Saskatchewan Spinster couldn’t have any knowledge of Pirates bein’ we’re so far from the sea. Well, I’ll just point ye here…or blimy, ta this cute one.
Need helping deciphering me pirate lingo; go here or here or here.
Remember, Dead men tell no tales. ;-0
Fair Winds to the crew of ye.
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