We read about them all the time. How regular people experience the cornucopia of sudden wealth and riches, and how this 'found money' alters the structure and essence of who they both were and are.
I first became aware of this by seeing it in action after it happened to a very close friend of our family. I've shared how my grandmother would take in all manner of people known as "bums" or more properly "hobos" and allowed them into her home.
Known for her large and extravagant meals, as a kid I'd hear a knock at the door, and an announcement from her that we were having a guest for dinner. Some of these individuals became regulars, but many of them were complete strangers, and ALL of them slept in the bedrooms just an arms length away from me and my sister.
As I grew into my teens, I became worried about having these complete strangers living amongst us, but my beloved grandmother wasn't worried, and refused to turn away a homeless and hungry hobo away from her door.
LUCKILY, aside from the final Latino illegal alien who attacked her (after asking her for food) leading to her death, none of the other needy souls ever harmed her or us, and none of them (save for the last one) stole anything from us.
Bill was a Native American who became a regular resident of my grandmothers house. We basically grew up with him, and whenever he lost the room that he rented or was otherwise homeless, he would come and stay with us. Bill was always unfailingly polite, and was a great help around the house to my grandmother.
As the years went by, we began to treat him like family, and when people would ask who he was, I'd introduce him as my uncle. Bill liked his "liquid refreshments" but was what one would affectionately call a "happy drunk" and he never gave us a moment of problems.
He was an amazing guy.
And then he won the lottery.
Bill had been poor all of his life, and considered it a blessing that we took him in and treated him like family. He'd stay for a few days, weeks, or even months, until he got back on his feet and was able to pay for his own place again.
One day while staying with us again, he failed to come home to the hot meal we had waiting for him. Knowing he was a friendly drunk, we feared that he'd been injured in an at5tack, or worse.
After checking with various hospitals and the local jail, we were overjoyed to find out that Bill had won the lottery! We all celebrated his good luck, and planned a joyous party to welcome his good luck. I was thrilled for him, as it honestly couldn't have happened to a better guy.
Or so I thought.
One day I ran into him downtown, and he ignored my greetings and rushed past me with his head down. This was TOTALLY unlike him, but we brushed it off as him being busy with the lottery office doing the paperwork for his money.
But it kept happening, and one day he completely ignored a greeting from my grandmother (hurting her deeply) when we were across the street from him. That was the last straw for me, and the next time I saw him alone, I confronted him.
"What's going on Bill? Since you won, you suddenly want nothing to do with the people that housed, fed, and clothed you when you were homeless? He replied that everyone was hitting him up for money, and he was going to flee town for good in order to get away from them.
"So you're going to leave without saying goodbye to us? to grandmom? She doesn't need your money, but I DO think you should offer her a $100 as a gesture of thanks for the years she spent taking you in, and say a proper goodbye.
He looked down, and said he would do it tomorrow, but I suggested that we do it right now, as she always kept a hot dish waiting for him at the dinner table.
He did come with me, and he did offer her $100. She of course refused it, but I accepted it on behalf of the family, then snuck it into her purse when she wasn't looking.
But the money changed him. Turns out he'd won just over $100,000 (which wasn't a lot of money to me), but he acted as if he'd won $100 million.
In the days before he fled, he stopped speaking to us completely, and then one day he was gone, off to Indiana, never to be seen again.
This abandonment affected my grandmother deeply, making her wonder if she'd done something to anger him. But I told her that we hadn't changed, but that it was the money that had changed him, so not to worry.
A few years later as what happens to so many people who come into sudden, unearned money, we found out that he'd blown it all and was broke (and homeless) again.
He put out feelers from Indiana with a mutual friend asking me if he could come back and stay with us again.
I told him not to bother, as he'd hurt my grandmother deeply, and I wasn't going to let him put her through that again. He was not welcome anymore, as the man we all grew up with didn't exist anymore. And that was that. We never heard from him again.
This all illustrates how we need to be mentally prepared for the life-changing event that coming into money can be. You don't ever want to see sudden riches as anything other than offering peace of mind when providing for the needs of yourselves and the people that love you.
That's a lesson that Bill never learned, but it's one that I never forgot. Money changes people, and it changed him in a way that affected all of us.
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