The other day a player from Santa Coloma de Gramenet won 7.6 million euros in the primitive draw. Mathematics states that the chances of winning this lottery are one in thirty million, infinitely less than the chances of winning the Christmas jackpot, which are one in 100,000, and yet, despite the numerical evidence, the staff continues to bet on it with delusional constancy.
The good thing about gambling, as long as you’re not a gambling addict, is that when your ticket doesn’t win a prize, or when you have to pay it back, you don’t experience it as a big disappointment either. In raffles, you can’t feel bad about losing, because you wouldn’t win because you’re upset, but in life in general the loser takes it badly, even if someone tells you, as if you were a marathon runner, that the important thing is to participate.
The loser has always had a bad press, no matter how much we sublimate Rick Blaine (Humphrey Bogart), the one from Casablanca; although who knows if in the end he won by letting Ilsa Lund (Ingrid Bergman) leave with the insular Victor Laszlo (Paul Henreid). From which it follows that better than winning is knowing how to lose, with dignity, with what they call lordship. We leave that gentlemanly thing for court cases, in which, definitely, you cannot lose.
It’s also very infuriating to lose objects, as valuable as they are, almost more than losing people (as long as they’re not irreparable losses), and it’s easy to waste time and patience. Probably the worst thing to understand is missing the bus, train or plane. Having the doors shut in your face, including the boarding one, is the Proust cake of all losses.
Who hasn’t remembered in that sad moment all the occasions when the draw is suspended on the day you have all the numbers. In short, maybe the one who won the 7.6 million from the original ends up losing peace of mind. I’m satisfied with a million, the rest I give as lost.
