R100 

You stand there in line with R100, clutched between your seasoned hands. Not too little of an amount but not too grand. The flimsy piece of blue paper that you easily give away at each race. The one that accumulates over the years most likely tall enough to reach a skyscraper, all in the complacency that you'll win something each time, because horse number 9 runs with record time.

Many people bet on this race each year. I think about millions per runner. It would be foolish not to, they say, it's a "thrill to escape the trudging days", they say. "Invest in shares, and you get taxed", but invest in the thrill of the games, and "most of what you win is tax-free" But for you the R100 isn't worth a just a sticky note that's passed around a high school class like secret wisdom. It's worth much more than you know. It's worth your morning toast. 

Yes, it's large, the winning prize for bets, and yes you win in-proportion to your bets, but you can't afford more than R100 and the reward you get in return is good enough to tame your day's needs and greeds.

You've been visiting my humble grounds for a decade, banking on your small easy money, but someone must tell you that luck too has its own bounds. For the past decade, you've been hoping to vault out of your trudging days, but this life isn't a game of pole vaulting, it's a marathon. 

If you spent the value of the R100 to fix the hole in your cap, you would at least have had the courage to walk the scorching 42 kilometers, even if it will take you a century around the track. So, what if I choose to show you that a marathon is difficult, but it's sadly more taxing when you're not even the one in the tracks?

Cheers trumpet my release from the rail as I thunder past the younglings at my flank.
A gap of 42 meters as I turn the first bend.
But what if, just what if... I take a frolic over the four-leafed clover? What if... I close my eyes and drift mindlessly ahead? What if I choose to show you that, yes, R 100 is flimsy to the naked eye, but if it's wrongly spent, you will never be able to fend for yourself, no matter how much you pretend?
 
You stand there with your tired hands covering your eyes from the sun. Your eyes squinting and wishing and praying to the heavens above. So, what would you do when you realise, that I, horse number 9, your object of luck, decide that today, my pace is worth more than your buck?

You trusted the race as if you're the one holding my reigns. As if you're the one giving me commands. You trust the same as if you're the one in the track. 

The loss of countless papers worth 5 packs of bread isn't enough to awake you from your apathy since you do not feel the burn in your calves as the mere spectator that you are. So today, I'll make sure you feel burn of a real loss, which hopefully, shouldn't hurt too much, considering you didn't even register to take part in the marathon.

Today I horse number 9, will not win, but all you hear from those at the Greyville counters and lines, and the casino tables is one question.
A question that you agreed to a hundred times. A question that has eaten R 100s more often than you in your entire life. 

It's all it takes for you to cross the flimsy line from a participant in the marathon to a spectator.
All of that, when they simply ask you, "will you go you all in?"