Back-fire

Fall arrived yesterday, and, right on schedule, everything is falling, falling, falling; the markets are reaching down to touch their toes, housing is scraping bottom, and the dollar is looking up from beneath the earth's crust.

I've been here before. More than once.

I'm not even talking about the historical "heres" - though I do remember one, vividly: gas lines around the block, everyone (including my dad) out of work for years, fear crawling into every corner of every household, at least the ones I knew. It was the '70's, and everyone proclaimed it, as today, "the worst financial crisis since The Great Depression." The entire country was hurting, and for far too long all of us simply did the best we could.

That one was personal for me. I was getting ready to go to college - had the scholarship, the job, even the car. Four days before I was due to leave for my small, private college, and the wonderful experience I knew was around the corner, my father called me in to tell me he and my mom wouldn't be able to cover even small percentage of the expenses that I hadn't already earned with work and awards. Four days before I was due to drive off - not four months or even four weeks, but four days.

Yet I left that Saturday anyway. How? My best friend talked me into trying to snag a spot at the state school she was going to. And, after many phone calls (the grades and SAT scores helped), I did. My parents could afford that tuition (in-state was then under $200, twice yearly) and the room and board (under $500) for at least a semester as long as I paid for books. I then pushed for (and won) a scholarship that covered my tuition (as long as I had a 3.9 average), tutored math to cover my books and incidentals, and even discovered a test (CLEP) that, when I took it, got me out of most of the basic degree requirements (so I finished in three years). I worked my ass off, and I won.

So why did I forget the lessons of those years? How did we all forget?

Fear feeds fear. When we hear the reasons for recessions and depressions, few "experts" think about the fear factor. Oh, we hear about "spirals" and "runs" and "panic" on the way down, but have we really thought it through? If we did, we might understand the entire cycle.

I see it this way: fear leads to free-falls which lead to more fear about the falls which leads to average people hitting the bottoms of their respective wells.

... which leads to either complete depression and giving up, or the back-against-the-wall "screw this!"

... which leads to the lowering of the head and the lunge for the enemy's throat.

... which, after some wrangling, frequently leads to success, which leads to more success (because we did what we didn't think we could do).

... which leads to "I deserve this success" and the gorging on that conquest and the next (which will follow because determination frequently leads to more) until we get drowsy in the sun and lazy when we take our hard-won abundance for granted.

... which leads to slippage and the first trickle of fear, especially when we find we can't quite grab it, not with the same ease, because it's easier to hold onto a leash than it is to catch one once we've let it go.

... which leads to fear which leads to more fear ...

Am I wrong? I'm no expert on money - we all know that, right? - but I understand fear, especially about cash flow. I've had it many times before. We all have. The college year just depressed and disillusioned me, but there was one day in 1992 or 1993 (the height - or depth - of the last "recession"). We had just moved to this very expensive area (without the army housing that we'd been in for more than a decade), we were maxed out across the board (rent, credit cards, etc.) with three small kids in the house, and, while I was choosing which bills to pay and which to blow off, I suddenly realized that, thanks to my life insurance policy, I was worth more dead than alive. Luckily that horrible thought immediately created an explosive "oh-God" back-fire that turned on the orginal problem and blew it out like giant Roman candle.

Oh, yes, I understand much about fear. I've been afraid lately, because my income depends on something that is optional, not necessary. And my quest depends on my house and my other assets NOT selling for half of the assessed worth, as they would right now.

But I realized this morning that right now we are in a panic because of our credit markets. And it isn't the first time. The excesses of the '20's led to the depression of the '30's, which fed the causes of WWII and the deprivations of the '40's (which we all handled with grace and hard work because we became a community), and led to the prosperity of the '50's, which preceded the turmoil of the '60's which caused a variety of new phenomena (stagflation) in the aforementioned '70's, then the ridiculous extremes of the '80's and the tight belts of the '90's, the happier times of the early '00's. Most of our past problems (except for the stuff around 911) are related, in one way or another, to spending as if there's no tomorrow, of pretending we can eat all we want and won't ever get the check.

Oh, I'm not saying there aren't other, insidious elements at work. I know about the greed of the credit companies, the mortgage industries, the sharks that are always waiting to take eat the small fish with no conscience because they can always declare bankruptcy, set up somewhere else, and start over. I know that the governments don't set good examples, either - they spend our tax money then plan this year's budget around last year's income instead of the average of the last 20 years, and they borrow money as if they will always have increased revenues (instead of using surpluses to repay these debts, our wonderful elected officials go into a feeding frenzy). We are the children of profligate parents, emulating their frightening patterns in our own lives.

But "they" are the smallest of the issues. At some point we have to grow up, and away from, toxic people. At some point we have to realize that we hired these people, or at least didn't speak up when they took over the company, the state, or the country. Instead of firing them all, we're turning to these same poisonous "role models" to bail us out - even as I write this, I'm listening to lawmakers blaming the lack of regulation in the asset markets (bank, mortgage companies, etc.) for our problems. And who's going to create and enforce these regulations? The same people who contributed to the spiral in the first place.

Enough is enough. I'm not afraid any more. There's got to be a way out of this, but it has to be our way. We have to end this once and for all - go not for the throat but straight for the heart.

We're the heart. And we're stronger than they are.