How Good Are You, Really?

Mason used to love bull riding and bull riders. From the time he was just about two until he was almost five, he has was obsessed pretending to ride bulls, watching Cowboy U over and over, dressing like a cowboy and roping the dog. It would only make sense that when he heard the advertisement for the Professional Bull Riders event coming to Sacramento he would want to go.

Of course we want to take our kids to see and do the things they love, but 2007 brought with it a strict financial plan that did not include a day at the arena watching bull riders. Our local country radio station has a promotion every weekend and appropriately guess what? Tickets to the PBR event, and an entry into a drawing for use of the KNCI box with a party for the winner and 15 of their friends.

I had not won on the radio in quite some time so when I felt that familiar excitement I knew I was going to win those tickets.

The first opportunity to call came and the sound we were listening for was not very easy to hear. This was good news because I think this increased my odds. You see, I have “Supersonic Radio Contest Hearing.” When the sounder played, I called and got a ring right out of the gate, no pun intended. "Caller number 1." Redial, busy, redial, busy, redial, busy, redial, ring! It’s ringing! “Caller 5” the DJ quickly answered and hung up. Oh good, I’m in I think as I hung up and redialed again. I dialed and redialed numerous more times and then the phone rang. “Caller 19” I hear. Not this time I thought as I waited to call again.

I tried to call the next time and I was callers 1, 12, 18 and 23! I needed to be caller 25. At this point I was unsure how many more opportunities I was going to have, so I called the radio station to ask how late they would playing. To y surprize, the DJ answered the phone saying “Hello, you win!” “Win? Win what?” I replied. It was a movie promotion prize pack and I immediately told him I did not want to win that, I wanted to win the bull riding tickets. He was a little taken aback but told me he would have more bull riding tickets in the next 10 minutes.

10 minutes later it was time to call and this time I had to answer a trivia question about Minnie Pearl’s hat. I was the first caller and I answered correctly and won. Mason did a very cute “Yee Haw Cowboy!” on the phone and we discussed that I just conceded the win a few minutes ago. I assured him I intended to be the winner of the grand prize on Monday and he informed me that this was a little sidebar contest, an extra pair of tickets that were not included in the weekend contest and thus did not qualify me for the grand prize. I told him I had to be in the drawing for the grand prize and I needed to pull out of this one, too. He was shocked. He asksed me if he could still play Mason on the radio since he was so cute and of course I said yes. He wished me luck and we hung up.

By now my husband was sitting on the couch in the living room in utter disbelief. He had heard me concede two prizes and had to come downstairs to see what is going on. While we were sitting together discussing all of this, it was time to call again. He started dialing on his cell phone and I was calling from our home phone. The phone was ringing and I won, I was caller number 25. This not only won me two tickets but I was now qualified to be in the drawing to win the grand prize. The DJ was blown away, he said “You really won. You are really caller 25” I know I told him. I let him know that I have an uncanny ability to win when I put my mind to it. “No kidding!” he said.

I won the tickets to take my family to the PBR event the following weekend but despite my best intentioned efforts, I did not win the grand prize for 15 of my friends to join us. No matter, I was elated and Mason got to see the bulls and riders. I love the power of intention and the ability to pull forth the things we desire for the people we love.