A Possum Fur Coat

28 June 2003


My heart goes out to the young Ashburton man who recently won $3.6million in LOTTO. He is the innocent victim of a shabby twist of fate, a dupe of the laws of probability. To buy a LOTTO ticket and not win is entirely acceptable behaviour. To buy a LOTTO ticket and win A VERY LARGE AMOUNT is life-shattering.

Consider this poor young man’s fate. Here he is, a completely normal, inconspicuous member of our community. He plays a bit of sport, socialises with his mates, thinks of moving in with the girlfriend. He seeks neither fame nor fortune. He buys a LOTTO ticket each week because that’s what you do, the pleasure of it being the slight frisson of anticipation when you check the numbers on a Saturday night or Sunday morning. All in all, life is good.

Then comes that fateful moment, those few seconds when the universe warps: a ball rolls, a number falls, zeroes sprout in the bank like silently mocking mouths. The fabric of this young man’s life is rent asunder and through the shreds he sees vistas of opportunity he’d never dreamed of. Terrifying.

He knows that nothing in his life will ever be the same. Sure, he’s heard the platitudes of previous big winners: “this is not going to change my life”, and so on. But he knows that a very large number is like a very large planet; it possesses an inescapable force of gravity that distorts anything in its path.

Above all, his wish is to remain anonymous. If word of his win leaks out he’ll be a marked man. Imagine the effect it will have on his friends and family. Buying a round of drinks will never again be a simple gesture of mateship. Every fundraiser and charity drive will be an agony of unfulfilled expectations: “he’s loaded but he only gave ten dollars to the animal shelter, the mean bastard”.

But anonymity in Ashburton is about as likely as good manners at a stag party. The whispering and pointing brigade are out on the streets, the grapevine sprouts and snakes through the conduits of our community like one of those fast forwarded Telecom ads. It’s bad enough for us non-winners, with everyone looking sidelong at each other, checking out who’s bought a new jumper or who’s splashed out on an extra large filled roll for lunch. Our hapless hero knows that one slip of form and his secret will be splashed from Rakaia to Tinwald.

What this young man with his $3.6million needs is a fall guy – somebody who will step up to the block and claim to be the winner. After considerable thought and discussion with my family, and purely out of a sense of compassion for this innocent man, I have decided to offer myself in that role.

Yes, I am prepared to take on the burden of publicity and sundry other consequences for nothing more than the satisfaction of helping a rich young man preserve his privacy. Well, okay, I’d be asking for a fairly large whack of the winnings as well, but nothing more than you’d consider a reasonable professional fee.

I’m prepared to go all the way with this. The first thing I shall do is make very loud and persistent denials that it was me who won. As any public figure knows there is nothing like denial to convince people of your guilt.

At a strategically considered moment I shall own up and, in a startling reversal of form, talk loudly and persistently about my good fortune. I will insist on a front page in the local paper - buying the space if necessary - and have myself interviewed endlessly on local radio, interspersed with my favourite Bachman Turner Overdrive hits.

I shall acquire the habits of the rich: become outrageously drunk in public places, be discovered naked and cavorting in the Baring Square fountain at mid-morning on a Tuesday, and have my nose reshaped by plastic surgeons of dubious repute.

I shall buy cars for each of my pets and hold up the traffic on West street while they alight to pee against the lamp posts. I will establish a charitable foundation and give large sums of money to futile causes such as Tranzrail and the Ashburton Riverbank Beautification Society.

I shall dress outrageously, in a three-quarter length possum fur coat and freezing works gumboots, to walk past the shops on East street waving effeminately and screaming loud hellos to my many friends.

I know these actions will have brutal consequences for my health, my public standing and my family’s wellbeing. But I will be buoyed up by the knowledge that I am helping a worthy young man retain the privacy he deserves – and by large dollops of cash.

Having effected this service once, I don’t see why I couldn’t do it for others. In fact, I could become a professional proxy for all the overnight LOTTO millionaires around New Zealand. Every Sunday morning you’ll find me blazoned across the front pages: Verstappen Wins Again – Unbelievable!

I urge Ashburton’s young millionaire to contact me at my website: www.foolsrushin.com