Let us take religion out of this picture. Let us move away from the ideologies that tell us gambling is sinful, immoral, and evil. Let us keep an open mind to one simple game that many of us have access to: the lottery.

This simple game costs one dollar to play, about the same as your average slot machine in Las Vegas or the local Indian casino; one hundred pennies for a set of numbers that could change your life for the better (or worse) but undoubtedly give you some of the most amazing dreams your imagination can create.

This game is not in a smoke-filled, windowless hall that gives you the illusion the sun is still at high noon. This game is played at a store, mini-mart, or small shop then taken home. This is where the dreams begin until the day the numbers are drawn.

It’s hard to argue that a dollar is one of the cheapest forms of entertainment around. Movie prices average eight dollars, and a music concert is well beyond what most of us really want to pay. That single lottery dollar can open up the imagination to possibility after possibility; all bound to the idea of becoming financially secure.

Let’s not think about the bad things that might happen if we were to win the lottery. Today it is only about the dreams, not the nightmares.

We move about our world, working our nine-to-five jobs to pay bills, to buy food, to support our families. We discover the things that remind us what life is all about. Some of these things remind us that money is the least valuable of all, while other things allow us to fantasize. The lottery ticket is one of these marvelous instruments. It exercises our brains. It owns no restriction. It upholds that unique human quality: imagination.

There are those who frown upon that dollar being placed in the register for a single slip of paper. For various reasons, they do not see the value of this form of entertainment. There is no denying that this is entertainment, but it is one linked to an activity some have defined as a vice. Nevertheless it provides amusement. It strengthens the imagination. It engenders enjoyment for a mere dollar, and that is worth more than a million winning tickets combined.