Did an Angel Whisper in my Ear Last Lottery Night?

It was a surprisingly warm November evening. The kind of evening that gives the illusion of a forever summer and revives hope that despite the calendar, there is so much warmth left in the year.
I sat at the kitchen table, and the telly in the corner of the room quietly shared the news of the day. The air was sweetly invaded by the scent of cinnamon from my neighbor’s kitchen–she was as predictable as the birds in the neighborhood. Every autumn, her kitchen was the source of sweet smells of apple pies, pumpkin bread, and everything pumpkin spice.
For a Tuesday evening, my mind was surprisingly active. It jumped from one thought to the next, searching for a resting point. There was so much on my mind, and I couldn’t quite figure out what it was that I was supposed to do next.
There is a little charm in these moments of restlessness. These times are a reminder that life is constantly on the move, and it cannot be paused or rewound. It was a moment like this when out of nowhere, a very clear instruction came. “Play the lottery.”
Play the lottery?
I was startled. The lottery was not part of my vocabulary. I didn’t know how to play it, and I had never considered it a possibility. But this thought was so clear and insistent, I grabbed my phone and searched for more details: how to play, how to buy a ticket, what are the odds, and what are the taxes on a lottery prize. You name it, I googled it!
It took me a little over an hour to do the research, and by the time I was done, it felt too late to actually play the lottery. So I set my alarm for the next morning, intending to buy a ticket on the way to work.
In the meantime, I started to dream. What if I won? Suddenly, my restless mind had found a beautiful resting point. The place where the biggest of dreams can be born and nurtured. I let myself go. I thought of everything I would do if I won the lottery. A big house for my family, a donation to a few chosen charities, a trip to the moon, a new pair of shoes for my neighbor’s son–the little boy who had the most beautiful smile–and so on and so forth.
Oh, the joy of dreaming big! My sleep was filled with images of big wins and bigger dreams until in my dream, I heard a soft whisper, “Remember, you haven’t won yet.”
I woke up the next morning with a smile on my face. I remembered the instruction to play the lottery and my subsequent research, but the dream was hazy. I even wondered if I should go through the trouble of buying a ticket. Just as I was contemplating this thought, I remembered the whisper from my dream. “Remember, you haven’t won yet.” And so off I went to buy that ticket.
It was a day like any other day. Nothing out of the ordinary happened. I handed over $2 to the cashier at the counter and picked the five numbers and a bonus number. The ticket confirmed my numbers, and I was now a lottery player.
Work was the same as usual, busy, and sometimes stressful. I forgot about the lottery, the dream, and the numbers I picked.
Thursday morning, I turned on the TV and waited for the numbers to appear on the screen. It was a mechanical action, and the moment the numbers popped on the screen, I turned away to get myself a cup of coffee. My phone vibrated just as I was stirring some sugar into my coffee. I picked up the phone and read the message, and that is when the coffee I had just sipped burnt my tongue. I let out a yelp and dropped the phone, hot coffee mug still in my hand.
The message on the screen read, “Congratulations! You have just won the lottery. Contact us to claim your prize.”
I rushed to the lottery office and verified my numbers. Indeed, I had won. Not just a small prize, but the big one–the one that can change lives and make dreams come true.
The rest, as they say, is history.