Dumb Luck

I've never really thought of myself as being funny. I don't have much of a sense of humor at all. My ex-husband used to tell me dumb jokes all the time and I didn't laugh, not even to be polite like everyone else would do. Yet the strange thing is that people who've read some of my life stories have found them to be hilarious. I'm not sure if that's good or bad considering those stories actually happened.

Let me put it another way: I'm not really funny; I just do dumb things. What kind of things you might ask. Well, the usual like walking down the street with my daughter, running my mouth at full speed until I walk right into the pole that I didn't see. I didn't find that episode the least bit humorous although my daughter and everyone else on the street did. See, I told you I have no sense of humor.

Doing dumb things seems to be part of my nature. For example, I used to love going to bingo. In fact, I was practically addicted. My sister-in-law and I would go to bingo faithfully and I will never forget some of our most embarrassing bingo moments.

One night as we were rushing to get to our favorite bingo, my sister-in-law, Sue took a leap of faith. And I do mean leap. Well, in all honesty it was more of a splat! She was running late as usual so she parked her car in the parking lot of the employment office which was right behind my house. The lodge where the bingo was being held was right across the street from my home. Sue hurriedly parked, grabbed her purse and bingo supplies, locked the car door and ran through the parking lot toward my house not realizing that a chain was blocking the other end of the lot. She ran right into the chain which sent her flying onto the concrete roadway as a rain of bingo chips fell down around her. Although her hands got scraped up a bit as she tried to brace for her fall, the embarrassment was more painful.

Then I recall another time when me and Sue decided to go to a late night bingo where the prizes were pretty high and we felt lucky. Apparently a lot of other people felt lucky too because when we got there the place was so crowded that we were offered two options: either turn around and go home (we drove quite a distance to get there) or sit on the floor. As we looked around at the other people who had opted for the second choice, we decided to join them. Our seating arrangements turned out to be in a most convenient spot - right next to the ladies restroom. At least I didn't have far to go to relieve myself of the vast amount of caffeine I had consumed throughout the day.

But as with most things, it did have its downside. Women kept stepping over us all night long on their way to the potty. My knees went stiff after sitting in semi-lotus position for over three hours and to top off the perfect night my entire winnings totaled a whopping five dollars! But the night wasn't over yet. It was kind of freaky when I glanced up at the window directly across the room from me and saw my husband's face gazing back at me. In the fraction of a second that it took to blink, I glanced back at the window and he was gone. I told my sister-in-law about the strange sighting but she just laughed and said he was on my mind.

As we filed out of the bingo hall with numb rear ends and lighter pockets, I heard my name cut through the night air in a harsh sounding but familiar tone. The bingo had actually lasted longer than we had anticipated and my husband was worried, not to mention, jealous and not as trusting as he should have been. All I heard was, "Get in the car!" I knew it was a waste of time to even argue. I was just glad that he could never stay mad at me for very long, even though I hadn't done anything wrong anyway.

It was certainly not a profitable night for me or my sister-in-law. Lady Luck had left us with sore buns, stiff knees an empty pockets. Talk about dumb luck!

Darlene Zagata is a freelance writer and columnist for the print publication Moon Shadows Magazine. She is also the author of "Aftertaste: A Collection of Poems" and "The Choosing." Her work has been published extensively both online and in print. For more information visit her website at http: //darlenezagata.tripod .com or contact Darlene at darzagata@ yahoo.com