My family was wildly ecstatic, my friends were honestly thrilled, my neighbors were giddily incredulous, my pastor was joyfully admonishing, my co-workers were playfully abusive but my accountant said,"Oh my God, this is not good, not good at all!" Well, I guess someone had to remind me that the IRS was looming, wringing its green stained hands, preparing its impending, imposing auditors to wave their red-flags at my once smiling face. Now the complicated implications began. How much of this stuff should I keep? Should I just take the car and the money? Do I have the wherewithal to negotiate the labyrinth of tax hurdles that these winnings have lain? My accountant, God bless his soul, sat me down like a child and told me horror stories of lottery winners, casino breakers and contest queens who were now either in debtors prisons or undergoing shock treatment for nervous exhaustion, brought on by the combination of forced lifestyle changes and a once skyrocketing, now plummeting bank account; not to mention his own 25% higher fee for the added paperwork in filing form 1040X-tra/1099$Y2K in triplicate, quarterly. As the saliva drooped from the corner of my gaping mouth, he gently dabbed the tears, welling in my eyes. Just think, for example, what does a guy in Brooklyn do with 38 vintage, VHS, black and white comedies; in the advent of DVD? What does a guy, who has adult children, do with a Choo-Choo Train bed? Where does one put an industrial sized food processor? (In the back yard perhaps; but then, where will the cats sleep?) A new washer and dryer always helps but never would fit into the tight space, perfectly built for the existing appliances. Furthermore, you'll never see the $1,000.00 that you so skillfully won at the Big Wheel. That went straight, no chaser, to the California State Tax Commission. And so on and so forth. I mustered the energy to look up at my accountant. "How the blazing hell do you know so much about me?" I whimpered. It was all so true. Time was, you could opt for cash in lieu of prizes but the ever insatiable tax legislators changed all of that. Now you must either accept the 25 foot trailer and pay taxes on it or you can refuse the eight foot ceramic Dalmatian and just go home with the personal laurel of Bob Barker's embrace. Oh, so you think that you should accept all the prizes and then just SELL them and keep the cash? That's double jeopardy. (without Alex Trebek) The law says, prizes won are judged as income, which again would be augmented if one sells the prizes. What a country! Well, my accountant tried admirably but I exorcised my fear and decided to keep it all. My brother got the train bed for his new baby. (So what, it's a girl? This is Brooklyn; they got female motormen, I mean motorladies-girls-persons, whatever, runnin' the subways!) The videos and the radios and CD players all became Christmas presents for family members. I have no idea who got the washing machine and dryer, we kept the car and paid federal and state taxes on it and bleep it, the food processor is in the back yard. Hey, I feel like I came out way ahead; to me, found fortune never is a liability! I believe and live by the words of Ralph Kramden:
"I had it and I went wid it!"
FINIS