The paper in my hand was stuck to me.

Not with some physical glue, but more with my full attention, and an unwillingness to put it down even against all the common sense in the world. I wasn’t willing to let it go, until I had scratched off every last number.

Every flick of the quarter was a stop of my heart, and every number I saw killed me inside when it didn’t match those at the top.

This was my shot at the big life.

Next year, I could be in a Lamborghini.

This was the lottery.

Walking in I didn’t even know today would be the day I ventured out into the open sea of luck and failure. I picked up my first lottery ticket as a game, but very soon I realized it wasn’t just fun and games anymore.

We ALL have heard about the dangers of addiction. High school is full of parents and professionals warning us about the danger of drugs and alcohol. These are definitely well-warranted concerns, and addiction is no joke. I recently learned the true pain and rush of an addiction to an unlikely culprit: the lottery.

Turning 18 is kind of a big deal. You are legal, and the world opens up to new possibilities all around you. You don’t need your parents anymore, and you can vote.

Everyone has something they do when they are 18, to prove to themselves that they have graduated into the next phase of life.

Turns out my self-fulfillment could be found in the lottery, that piece of paper that can take you from rags to riches at the scratch of a square. For just $5, $10, $20, you have a shot at a thousand, a hundred thousand, a MILLION sweet bills of money in return. I went in with $15, bought a $5 ticket, and began to make my way down the rows number by number with my only quarter.

Turns out I won the lottery.

Winning in this context doesn’t equate to much, actually just enough to compensate my costs AND something for a drink. A full $10 back, and I felt like I had just won a war against fate itself.

The reputation of the lottery is its unreachable quality, and only a certain few will ever taste its treasures. Just $10 out of the machine had me feeling like I had just accomplished an infinitely rare feat. The only thing I could do, obviously, was to take advantage of my incredible luck.

My now $20 prize pot dwindled quickly to zero, and I felt somewhat dumb. That being said, I know that if I had gone in there with $50, $100, $500, I still would’ve either ended up with zero or a lot more. The rush of playing, and the proof that I COULD win, was too much for me to pass up in the moment.

In retrospect, it’s a scary thing, feeling out of control of your own common sense, and knowing that these are the dangers which lead people to homelessness. In the moment, I never thought of that though, and I was more focused on my future mansion than my future cardboard box. Of course, these get-rich-quick schemes ruin people everywhere. The lottery, gambling, ponzi schemes, con artists: they all make hopeless out of the hopeful and make their own money out of misery.

Still, the rush is fun, and I can see the appeal. I have to stay away from the lottery now, just because it scares me; not because of what it does to me, but what I am capable of doing to myself.

I don’t regret doing it though, and committing myself to my new adult life. Turns out the best thing that happened to me that day was going in with only $15.