Part 1 -My True 1 Million Dollar Lottery Story

This is a true story. It happened to me and this is a first account. Enjoy everyone!

It's hard to believe that in my lifetime, and at such a young age, I have already had the opportunity to win the lottery. Not in a hundred years did I ever think I would win the lottery and especially such a huge amount by anyone's standards. It was a pivotal moment in my lackluster life. What happened on that cool Fall day would change my life forever.

Back in 1993, I was a 23 year old college student with lofty ambition. My new boyfriend and I had just moved to the Okanagan from the back country in Kamloops, BC and it was exciting. I wasn't used to living in the city but it felt like a cool adventure at the time. We were living in a rental suite below a great family in a nice, quiet neighborhood. We had a cat, a truck and we both had jobs. Things were pretty good for us. We had food to eat and gas in the truck. What we didn't have was anything extra. As a matter of fact, we had scrimped and saved for months to buy a used TV from the old Wosk's furniture store. They did a layaway plan and I was only 1 payment away from owning a "big screen" 30 inch TV. Things were really looking up.

We had moved into our place during the winter and in our first month, the hot water tank blew up and flooded our entire bedroom. What a friggin' mess! Our mattress was on the floor at the time and it was damaged. Tons of boxes with books and photos were also destroyed. It was a little stressful to see all of that water.

At the time, I was working a part time cleaning shift at a hotel while I was in school. I was studying computer design and graphics and I was feeling really good about the move and my new life. My boyfriend (Jim) worked construction in and around the Okanagan. Like I said, things were pretty good for us with the exception of the flood. It kind of messed us up for a few days so there was a little tension in the house while we tried to figure out what to keep and what to throw away. We opted to just chuck anything that was soaked. It made me sad as we lost some cool stuff. But, it was just stuff. No big deal.

In the midst of this crazy flood, my boyfriend mentioned that his sister and her boyfriend wanted to come visit. Not great timing but we all got along and we had a little space to accommodate so it would be fine.
Jim and I decided to spend a few bucks...around $25 getting some groceries for our guests. We would do what we could to be good hosts on a tight budget. After spending the $25, we were left with about $45 in our pocket.

On Friday, Tina arrived around 3pm and I had just finished my course and came home to change for work. My boyfriend took the afternoon off and was already home. I mentioned to the others that I may have to stay in for the night. I was kind of beat and I wasn't into partying. They wanted to hit the bars and that really wasn't my thing. Plus, I was stressed about the flood and I was pissed off at my boyfriend for something. I told them to have fun and I went to work. On my way out the door, I told Jim to stop by Wosk's and put the last payment on the TV for me and we would pick it up in the morning. He said "okay."

I arrived home around 9 pm after a long shift in the laundry room. Man, it gets bloody hot folding and pressing linen. Not my favorite part of the job. I knew that my weekend was just around the corner and I looked forward to a good sleep and a nice breakfast with the gang in the morning. This was 1993 so cell phones were not really a common sight and you couldn't get in touch with someone unless you called a landline. I did get a call that night from Tina. She was calling from the bar to say they would be out for a while longer. I didn't mind. I wanted to sleep.

At around 2 am, the 3 of them staggered into the suite, totally wasted and looking like they had a great time. I was awakened kind of abruptly and got a bit cranky. I told everyone to just sleep it off and I would make a nice pancake breakfast around 9 or 10 and then we would cruise over and pick up our new (used) TV. We all fell asleep.

I am a morning person so I woke up around 6 am (without a hangover) and took the cat outside for a little romp. I enjoyed a coffee on the deck. It was a nice morning. I thought I would let everyone sleep.

Around 6:30, I tiptoed into my bedroom to grab something and I heard a faint mumble come from Jim. I said "You guys must have had a great time last night! Sorry that I was too tired to go out." He just rolled over and said in a still drunken manner "Oh, I have 2 lottery tickets in the truck...you can grab them and let's scratch and lose together."

You can probably guess where this was going. I started to get hot and red and really angry. I said in the quietest voice I could "Did you put the money on the TV because that was the last $25 we had?" Jim said "No, I bought 2-$20 lottery tickets, I was drunk, I should have just bought 1 but this guy behind me wanted the last one and I said no way, I will take both!" Shit, was I ever livid! This was going to be a rough day. I am pretty structured and this threw me off a bit. We didn't have a TV back then and I was so looking forward to watching something entertaining after school and work instead of reading. Don't get me wrong. I love to read but the prospect of hooking up a VCR (no DVD's yet) was also something I really was excited about.

I just turned and walked out of the bedroom, put on my shoes and headed out to the truck. I brought the keys with me because most people lock their doors at night...not Jim, not that night...come to think of it, how did the truck get home? Anyways, I digress. I opened the truck and there, in the side door pocket were 2 $20 lottery tickets. The 20th Birthday Millions game. I guess this was an anniversary type ticket. I had a feeling in my gut that I might throw up. Payday was over a week away and here I was, sitting with 2 pieces of fucking shiny paper to look at! I walked back into the bedroom and threw the tickets on the night table. I was so unimpressed because Jim just reeked like booze and he wasn't the least bit concerned that he just spent all of our money. He tried to make me feel better by saying that his sister and her boyfriend took care of the whole tab for the night. Well, that made me feel a bit better.

I tried to contain my negative attitude and brought some coffees into the bedroom so we could "scratch and lose together."
I handed Jim a ticket, I took the other one and proceeded to "scratch with attitude." The whole time I kept saying to myself...so much for the new TV. I almost put a hole in the ticket with the fierceness of my scratching. Jim says after scratching his ticket..."oh well, maybe next time." I stop scratching my ticket to just have a look at what was on that shiny piece of paper. I had anger colored glasses on so I really had to focus.

Well, I looked at the ticket and then I kind of gasped...my mind was saying "I think we won something." I thought about the last $25 we had to put on the TV and I felt hopeful....maybe, just maybe, this would be a $50 winning ticket!!!! I started to become a little happier. I put the ticket down and say to Jim " We are buying the TV today with the winnings, okay?" He agreed.

Now, if you have ever won something before, you know that first feeling of disbelief and the lump in your throat. This is what I remember first. I looked down at the smaller game square on the ticket after scraping the last bit of foil off and said "There are so many zeros. How many zeros are in a million?" Jim says "6 and quit fucking around". I said "I think we may have won a million dollars." He laughed. I just looked at him and said "count these zeros with me." He leaned in and started counting...I remember how each zero looks still in my head. Jim gets up on top of the bed (with a new used bed frame) and starts jumping up and down screaming! I do the exact same thing and we are not being quiet! The whole house is awake by now and Tina comes into the room and says "No, those tickets were winners? How much?" I yell out " A million fucking dollars!" She screams "Holy shit, holy shit, call the parents!" We thought about it for a minute and decided to not call anyone until we had the ticket confirmed.

We all got dressed and Jim put on pants with zipper pockets and zipped the ticket into his pants and put a huge, long winter coat over top and zipped it up tight. He was still drunk from the night before so we had to walk a km to the nearest all night store. We headed out the door, ticket in lock down and made our way up the hill. It felt like a million blocks not 2! We got to the little corner store at around 2 minutes after 7am. They just opened...imagine the thrill when the guy checks the ticket. We actually locked the front door and asked him to check it. He agreed. This was a big fucking deal. Oh my dog, was I shaking. We all waited on bated breath to hear that little jingle and boop a dee doo there it was....What a sweet sound! We grabbed the ticket, put it in lock down again and headed back to the house. We had to make some phone calls...

This is the Luck Magazine from Sept 26, 1994. That is me...Shannon and the ex on a pretty crazy day!