I admit it. This week’s stock market wild swings have made me anxious and worried. Not necessarily about my own tiny investments, but about America.
I am a member of the Baby Boom generation. Parents of the Boomers were survivors of WWII, and went on to enjoy the greatest economic expansion this country has ever known. Of course, prior to this they also, as children, experienced the Great Depression.
Parents of the Baby Boom generation began their life in difficulty and were aware of the unfairness of the class structure in America. Oh, we don’t call it class structure. We call it unlimited opportunity for those who strive to attain it. We call it working hard to reach the top. We call it lots of things, but we don’t call it similar to buying a ticket in a lottery and hoping we win.
Parents of the Baby Boom generation survived – and won – the greatest war this earth has ever known. They saved us all from evil. Their government went on to build the richest, most powerful economy ever known. Service men and women from WWII came home, attended universities, brought about the Age of Technology. They created the Baby Boom generation. Their peers who chose to forego higher education and instead entered the trades, farmed, or otherwise made their living were pulled into economic success by their more ambitious peers. By the late 1960’s, it seemed as America was forever destined to increasing economic prosperity – and this was the mantra the Baby Boom generation adopted as it began university schooling, careers, and families. Labor unions, fantastic employee incentives, regular promotions, and more created a work culture that lulled many into the belief that they were entitled to so much.
Then the societal upsets of the 60’s and 70’s caused many to question the values America had adopted. But little changed. The 80’s brought a resurgence of the belief in the invincibility of America, and the right of America to exert its form of government, its way of life, itself upon every ‘undeveloped’ nation in the world.
American’s believed in the government mantra of ‘We are America! We can do, make, and solve anything if we just put our minds and backs into it!’ We lifted ourselves out of recessions, we expanded democracy, we created programs to send our young to foreign countries to ‘help’ them, and we poured untold monies into our military and created the most effective fighting force the world has ever known. We went to the moon and beyond, we surveyed the ocean, we won the Cold War, we fought poverty and disease worldwide . . . and more.
As the children of the Baby Boom generation began their adulthood, the culture of America had become something that their grandparents couldn’t recognize. It is overwhelming in its diversity of – everything. It is fast, pressured, cynical, cold, profit driven like never before. It is fractured as families have moved from the multi-generational model of the pre-WWII days, to the nuclear family model of the 50’s, and now to a model that is so diverse that no one can really measure it.
All the while, the values of our country have turned from close family ties to . . . make more money! Buy more things! Achieve more! Be mobile! Get ahead!
Am I the only person longing for a return to the values of the past? Am I the only person who feels anxious about the direction America is headed? Am I the only person who does NOT believe the clowns in Washington D.C., who continually speak out of both sides of their mouths?
Yesterday as I witnessed yet another wild ride on Wall Street, due in large part to the political stupidity that nearly drove our country into default just 2 weeks ago, something in me said enough! I transferred my little savings into bonds. Forget what the financial talking heads say about staying long in the markets! I unhooked my cable TV box and today it is going right back to Comcast! I have no idea what the financial markets are doing right now and I don’t care. I am content to finish the quilt in my sewing room, check on the vegetable garden, create a new dish for dinner, pet the dog, call my friends, IM with my son, read a decent book, do a little laundry, play (badly) my piano, or simply sit and sip coffee and watch the sun rise.
I am checked out, happily oblivious, and otherwise too busy to listen to, riddle over, and pay attention to the drivel that is being handed out by D.C., the financial wizards who have driven our markets into chaos, and the yahoos who consider it their duty to make us aware of all the ills of the world.
Come to think of it, that is probably the life my grandparents and their parents enjoyed. As I recall, before the great economic expansion following WWII, their lives were filled with farm chores because they had to grow their own food and tend their own livestock – without Uncle Sam’s help. They also made their own clothing, blankets, etc. – without the need for Costco, etc. Many built their own homes – debt free – with their own felled logs and without the supplies from Home Depot. They ran their own small businesses – without the help of Wall Street.
Yep, I’m checking out. And loving it! Follow me in – the water is just great!
No comments:
Post a Comment