Cashing out...

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IN MY OPINION
Big dreams are made of this

Ana Veciana-Suarez
from the MiamiHerald Posted on Sat, Feb. 25, 2006

If you're reading this, the likelihood is you didn't win last weekend's $365 million Powerball jackpot, the biggest payout in U.S. history. Your life remains the same old, same old. Your dream home (by the beach, in the mountains, somewhere far from the bustle) is still on hold. Shucks.

Eight workers at a Nebraska meat processing plant, not you or me, claimed the record winnings this week, meaning each will get about $15.5 million after taxes. It took them four days to come forward, enough time for many of us to entertain thoughts about what we would do with all that money. Those daydreams say plenty about our hearts' desires.

But first, a little perspective about sudden millions. Winning the lottery, some would have you believe, is not all it's cracked up to be. According to fable, sudden wealth is more curse than blessing, more shackles than liberating key. Read some of the recent postings addressed to the new millionaires:

``Move to Tahiti. Don't tell anyone. Live discreetly. And most of all tell your begging friends to go win their own lottery.''

``You will make your children and family targets of kidnapping and blackmail attempts with this amount of money. Take time, do some research, and find very serious, knowledgeable and trustworthy council (sic) . . .''

Such warnings, however dismal, bear some truth. Seventy percent of those who become suddenly wealthy squander it within a few short years, according to the National Endowment for Financial Education. And about one-third of lottery winners eventually declare bankruptcy -- so says the Certified Financial Planners Board of Standards.

There are plenty of individual examples. Jack Whittaker, who won $315 million in 2002, had $545,000 stolen at a strip bar, had several run-ins with the law and lost a granddaughter to a drug overdose. Evelyn Adams won the New Jersey lottery twice in the mid-1980s, but still managed to lose the entire $5.4 million and reportedly lives in a trailer. The late William ''Bud'' Post II, who won $16.2 million in a Pennsylvania payout, was successfully sued by his girlfriend for a third of the winnings, fired a shotgun over a bill collector's head, failed at several businesses with his siblings, and then -- to add insult to injury -- his own brother was convicted of trying to kill him. In short, money earned suddenly and without effort can be unlucky.

Yet, who doesn't dream of becoming an instant multimillionaire, of calling a mansion home and parking a fleet of cars in the garage, of traveling the globe in luxury, of ensuring the family's future? Sure, money can't buy happiness, can't even assure us of true love, but, let's be honest, it does provide options, possibilities.

Which brings me to the dreams adults entertain when flights of fancy turn to windfalls. How would my friends behave? Sure, they would splurge on the vacation home and the newer car but, much to my surprise, most everybody would continue working. Maybe not at the same job. Maybe not for others. Maybe not the same amount of hours and days. But almost to the person, they would choose To Do.

One wants to start her own business. Another wants to run his own foundation, a third to return to school. Many want to chase the dreams they abandoned in youth, when earning a paycheck ruled out an artistic life. All would give a portion of their winnings away.

I find those responses uplifting and pragmatic, for they recognize two verities of life: Things are not as important as experiences and, in the end, you can live only so long without structure and routine.