by Trey Nosrac

The orange sun dipped low on the horizon, dolphins sliced the placid surface of the Gulf of Mexico with silent blades, and Trey headed to the Crow Bar & Grill to compose an email to resuscitate the sport of harness racing…

April 12, 2017

Dear Charles Ergren, Ray Dalio, Jim Walton (and the rest of the Waltons), John and Jacqueline Mar, Len Blavatnik, Thomas Peterffy and Abigail Johnson,

According to a recent Forbes Magazine article, you are among the wealthiest people in America that I have never heard of. You may notice that I did not include three other extremely wealthy people on the list — Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos and the tall Koch brother. They are not on the addressee list because I emailed them four years ago with a foolproof plan to join me in investing in a yearling and they rudely snubbed me. Time heals all wounds, so if you have contact information, feel free to forward this memo and tell them I am no longer miffed.

Relax moguls; this is not a plea to get into your portfolio, which I imagine you hear as frequently as December letters to Santa. Rather, this is a flare in the night that may give you something valuable, something your forerunners discovered that made their lives richer.

Corny Vanderbilt, Lee Sanford and Johnny Rockefeller rose from humble roots, worked their tails off, amassed ridiculously huge fortunes and began to flounder a bit. This career path may sound familiar. These early tycoons discovered that having more money than one can spend was not a guarantee of fulfillment or happiness. In a couple of these cases, the titan’s health began to crack from the stress and their doctors gave them a strange prescription — get behind a horse. Somewhat late in life, these early magnates found a tonic that sustained and fulfilled them for the rest of their lives.

In Lexington, Kentucky, on Tuesday, October 3, 2017, there will be an event called the Lexington Select Yearling Sale. This is an annual auction featuring gorgeous young horses, nice people, big dreams and free food. You would enjoy it. If you want to have even more fun, bring one of your billionaire pals. You can come incognito. Nobody in our crowd will pay any attention; they will be in a trance looking at yearlings and catalogues.

Should you make this visit, at the very least it will be educational. There is also an outside chance that the visit may change your life in a positive way. Have your people call my people, I will hook you up.

Sincerely,

Trey

Non-billionaire

P.S. Suggested attire is extremely casual with a slightly western motif.

Addendum — When I shared this odd column with a colleague, he scoffed.

“You fool, those people will never see your post in HRU and those people would never associate with someone like you.”

This scoffing irked me. A bit of a verbal tussle ensued. A wager eventually tendered — 10-1 that a name on this list makes any sort of contact, 50-1 that anyone actually appears at Lexington. I have blown five bucks on worse things.

As to his first remark that you will not read this communiqué, the Internet is very good at penetrating the gatekeepers of famous people. Famous folks are on the alert and have their minions on the alert, for any mention of their name. You would be amazed at the famous people I have reached with this type of peculiar Internet message, including an actor named Todd who played “Swimmer #2” (who was devoured in an early scene) from the movie classic Sharktopus.

As to his second remark that you will not associate with me; that is possible. So let me sweeten the pot by offering to pay for your hotel room at the Motel 6 in Lexington and supply you with a free LYFT ride from the airport to Fasig-Tipton.

My wager is in your hands. I hope that you are a regular person who likes an adventure. We will see.