When my parents were getting older, some of their long-standing friends began to die.

“Mom and I are going to have to make some new friends who are twenty years younger than we are,” my dad said. He was very pragmatic (a characteristic that he passed on to me).

And while he did indeed find younger friends, he also outlasted all of them – because he lived to be 104.

This morning, a close friend of ours for 50 years, shared that she has been diagnosed with inoperable cancer. Her doctor told her that she between has six months and a year to live.  There is an old joke in which the patient says to his doctor, “I won’t even be able to pay off your bill in six months.”  The doctor replies, “All right.  Then I’ll give you a year.”

But all joking aside, when a friend has limited time – we are reminded that it is more important than ever to appreciate every minute. Our friend has already begun to put her affairs in order and wants to spend more time with Daveen and me over the next months.  I’m glad she is giving us that chance. No doubt, we will all appreciate each other more, now that we have a deadline.  As in the song “Big Yellow Taxi” reminds us, “don’t it always seem to go, that you don’t know what you’ve got ‘til it’s gone.”

Of course, during the past 28 months of COVID we haven’t been able to visit with our old friends, let alone new ones. And yet, more than ever I find myself contemplating, how can I squeeze more awareness into each minute of my life?  I’m not sure.  I’m reminded of the 2007 movie The Bucket List with Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman.  Unlike them, I’ve already completed my bucket list, and more.  As my dad used to say during his last 20 years, “I give thanks for every new day.  It’s a bonus.”

Is your bucket list half full, or half empty?  How are you choosing to live your life? Years ago, Daveen and I were planning to vacation in Hawaii.  A friend suggested we fly first class.  “If you don’t use your money to fly first class today, one day your children will.”  Ouch!  That might be true.  We flew first class.

I’m tired of putting my “regular” life on hold for Covid.  So, Daveen and I are off to San Diego for a weekend getaway.  We plan to see Taming of the Shrew at the Old Globe Theater, and then relax and watch an NBA game in our room the next night.

Hopefully, we’ll all soon be out and about, adding check marks to our bucket list.  None of us has forever.

Alan

According to an article I just read, we “turn off” our emotions when dealing with numbers.  Yet it also concluded that if we are aware of that, we can minimize the “turning off.”  So here we go. I am about to share with you some financial advice backed up by numbers. No one has to become emotional about this.

For many years I have refused to have anything to do with selecting investments in the stock market.  Even though I have always fancied myself as an investment genius, my record in the stock market has been reliably dismal.  Not just mediocre.  I’ll put it in caps.

DISMAL.

And it’s because of the losses.

For example, suppose I invest $20,000 in each of five stocks.  The first four go up 15% and I sell at a profit of $3,000 each – for a total profit of $12,000.

Gosh darn it!  Four successful investments with a 15%, or $12,000 profit.  I would be happy with that every time.

Unfortunately, the final $20,000 investment drops in value by 80% and I finally sell at a $16,000 loss (after watching the inexorable decline in my investment, something I do not enjoy).

That one loss not only wiped out all of my profit from the sale of the other stocks, it also left me a total of $4,000 behind.

The obvious goal for all of us when investing?  Avoid losses. So for me, the lesson learned is simple. Avoid the stock market.

I will continue to follow the advice of the 20^th century actor and humorist Will Rogers.  His simple stock market recipe:

Buy a stock.

When it goes up, sell.

If it doesn’t go up, don’t buy it in the first place.

Thanks, Will.  By paying attention to you I haven’t lost a dime in the stock market for many years.

Alan

In the current invasion of Ukraine, Russia has threatened to employ tactical nuclear weapons. The risk that Russia might launch nuclear missiles toward Ukraine, or one of its allies, reminds me of a time during the Cold War. In the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1963, the United States learned from satellite photos that the Soviet Union was building nuclear missile launch sites in Cuba.

Our President, John F. Kennedy, promptly dispatched navy ships to form a blockade around Cuba and prevent the Soviet ships from transporting their missiles.  This resulted in a very tense ten-day stand-off between the US and Russia. No one knew how it would end, but nuclear war seemed like a strong possibility.  My wife Jo Anne and I were 23 years old, and we, like many Americans, were scared.

We were so sacred that we packed our suitcases, left our one-bedroom apartment near Santa Monica, and drove North for greater safety. We had no destination in mind.

When COVID first appeared in 2020 I felt a similar need to escape.  Of course, with COVID, there was nowhere to go but to shelter at home.  Perhaps that was also true in 1963, but I always feel better when I’m taking action and not just worrying.

Jo Anne and I drove around aimlessly for a few hours, ending up in Oxnard, California, about forty miles from where we started.  We spent the night at the same motel we had stayed in on our wedding night two years before.

The following day the Soviet Union blinked and turned their ships around.  Crisis averted.  Everyone returned home.

We did not know at the time that JFK had secretly agreed to a deal – in exchange for the removal of the missiles from Cuba, he would remove U.S. missiles threatening the Soviet Union from launch pads in Turkey.

But what I discovered after returning to our apartment in 1963 was even more scary.

The motel we had chosen to hide in for safety was located a few blocks from the Oxnard Air Force base that would have been a prime target for Soviet nuclear missiles, if any had actually been launched.

From this experience I learned that sometimes the best response to a threatening situation is not to react but to do nothing.

The trick, of course, is to know, without the benefit of hindsight, which alternative to choose.

Alan