Quote: I grew up poor. Devastatingly, not sure where our next meal was coming from - poor
BTDT really bad in 1952. It got better after 1956.
Quote: Do you think it is fear that powers your response in this situation?
Parents lost a house do to dad's poor health and the economic depression during the 1930's before I was born.
Poor child hood, electricity turned off a couple of times because of some toys in relationship to the income.
I went to work got over that mostly.
Back injury in 1981 just enough savings and insurance disability payments to get by. Recovered from that financially.
1986/7 another back injury. Learned from the first one not to live paycheck to paycheck. Went to C for low self worth because I lost who I was, Lou the self-taught good auto mechanic with a part time business at home. Went to college, new career, I am more than what I do for a living. Went back to work earning half of what I did as a mechanic in new field working with ungrateful brats. Stock market takes dive but recovers. I quit because of office politics.
1994 I start my business while working with the delinquent boys at the group home. I quit the group homework in 1997. I got busier every year but did not make more profit. 9/11/2001 my insurance and heat bill doubled so I moved my business back home. Stock market makes retirement fund lose 40% of its value. BB wants to sell and go to Vegas before we lose it all.
Today, another 9/11-type incident could cause the stock market to drop and get BB in a position to want to sell things we should keep.
I am not a doomsday type of person. I don't get excited if the stock market is going up or down. It does that if you look back a hundred years. Some people get excited at market highs and want to die if the market drops 25%. I am not a day trader, or a what’s new and hot type of guy. i will never discover the next Google type of stock (price to 2003 earnings ratio of 329) Give me a quarter here a dime there.
In general, I learned crap happens, good things happen too. Be prepared for both. Sometimes “new” really means more plastic / fake / empty promises. Value what works. Also what is new adds to the burden of what you have to dispose of some day.
