Christmas in February? Happy Warren Buffett Day!

WOOT WOOT!

Capitalist Christmas… yes, children… each year in December, happily excited tykes send their wish lists to Santa with great hopes for future “riches”.

Sugar plums and train sets and Barbie’s.. ok, maybe I’m slightly outdated on the Santa wish list scene.

But today … today … in the doldrums of chilly February … my Santa-of-a-sort has sent a letter of riches back to me and millions of other little investors (that could be you).

The old, wise man of western capitalism – let’s call him Warren Buffett, shall we – released his annual letter (http://www.berkshirehathaway.com/letters/letters.html) that is a goody bag filled to the brim with witticism and sagacity and humour and good ole common sense where it comes to protecting and investing your hard earned bucks.

Buffett is an artful wizard of metaphor which makes what should be dry, cumbersome reading into a learning experience of kindergarten simplicity.

If you take the time to read through each of his 41 years’ worth of annual letters, it will take you beyond your MBA in investing savvy – all while enjoying the fruits of his homespun delivery.

You might even begin hanging out with Jeff Bezos and Dragon’s Den’ers or Shark Tanker’s.. nah….

The only caveat I might add is that while Buffett has a way of making investing sound simple… the reality is that he is a once-in-a-lifetime financial literate.

You will learn at the knee of greatness, but alas, you and I will most likely achieve only a tiny fraction of his wealth…

But … HELL … when a tiny fraction of Warren’s net worth is in your pocket, you will be richer beyond your dreams … even if you are a MEGA (not MAGA) dreamer!!

In the meanwhile my friends, I’m pretending (for the next week) to live the Warren Buffett lifestyle of the Rich and Famous while falling WWWwhoaaaaaa!!… clumsily from a surfboard off the white sandy beaches of Playa del Carmen…

Maybe it IS true… fake it until you make it!

Letters Of Hope From Mom and Bill Gates

My young playful Mom

I got a bunch of letters from my Mom the other day.

There were, and still are, hours of wonderful reading and digesting.

The artistically sculpted handwriting that wove the stories of my family’s daily goings-on wasn’t a genetic trait passed on to me as it was to my two sisters … I find my words sinking into a steadily deteriorating scribble that’s readable, but just.

Did I mention that my Mom died more than 45 years ago?

Obviously, the letters that I’m talking about weren’t written yesterday. They’re nestled in a box of archived family photos and memorabilia I’ve held onto. A good deal of it has also been passed to me by others, my siblings, aunts and uncles and distant cousins.

My eyes glaze a tiny bit as I hum Jim Croce’s Photographs and Memories.

My night owl Mom would write late at night when she was most awake, the house dark and silent. Sitting at the dining room table, smoking her homemade, unfiltered cigarettes, her words and thoughts glided onto the pages. Sometimes 3, 4, even 10 pages long.

Most of the letters were written in the 1960’s and early 1970’s to my older brother Robert who had moved west to Edmonton for university. These were the years where my siblings and myself were at our most volatile and malleable, the times when most of our life’s major decisions were being formulated and dreamed.

Lots of talk about school exams and boyfriends/girlfriends/weddings, painful ear infections, paper routes and bitter snowstorms.

 

The “small” stories held in the probably more than 200 pages of handwritten love aren’t the ones that capture newspaper headlines: there are no abbreviations like LOL or UR or WTF, the script lines are written on clean white unlined paper, mostly 8.5 x 11 inch.

The grammar and spelling are excellent (although I would call her out for using real instead of the adverb really!) given they were written by a farm girl from tiny Hillsburg, Ontario, born in an era when education for girls was far less important than striving for their MRS.

Mom’s words were mostly fun and newsy and very optimistic. Nostalgic and warm. Written close to the end of her years – she sadly died before she reached 61 years old – they were filled with the plans and stories that show a woman who found the best in each person and the immense love for the family that she had surrounded herself with.

Yes, my Mom was dedicated to her family … my Mom was optimistic despite any troubles that no doubt existed. Everyone has troubles.

Sure, Mom would have had problems (tell me one woman with 5 kids that doesn’t have troubles) … Bill Gates has troubles too I bet. Yes, THAT Bill Gates.

Bill Gates sees troubles in the world.

I got a bunch of words in a letter from Bill and Melinda Gates the other day.

Their letter outlines a myriad collection of problems that exist in the world, “we’re highlighting nine more things that have surprised us along this journey. Some worry us. Others inspire us. All of them are prodding us to action. We hope they do the same for you, because that’s how the world gets better.”

I wasn’t a great fan of Bill Gates when he ran Microsoft.

He always seemed to be attempting to take over the technology of the world with inferior products. He shoved and elbowed to crush whatever competition was waiting and was willing to use all the levers at his devious disposal to eliminate them.

But since leaving as head of Microsoft 10 years ago, Gates and his partner Melinda have found a softer side, or at the very least, a very positive use for his drive to dominate.

The Gates Foundation is a huge philanthropic force dedicated to improving the lives of everyone using technology and intelligent processes. Diseases such as AIDS and malaria have been major focuses, as has the education of young women.

Gates is the antithesis of Trump… Gates, like me, believes that improving the lot of the poorest, sickest, and most destitute the world over improves all our lives. He uses real data, real news, real hope, to combat the fake and the transparently false.

Reading my Mom’s and Gates’ letters this week has left a warm glow inside me.

I’m always on the lookout for mentors, near and far… those who inspire with their deeds.

This week has brought me the gift of a positive glow from that most intimate source… my mother, speaking to me from the past… and an external source of wisdom and hope, Bill Gates, holding confidence and promise in the future.

Optimism … I watched Kacey Musgraves singing at the Grammy Awards this week… her simply optimistic song, Rainbow, “ … there’s always been a rainbow hangin’ over your head.”

Or, as Bill and Melinda Gates write: “The more optimists there are working for a better future, the more reasons there are to be optimistic.”

 

SING! SING!! SING!!!

 

Mary Poppins loves to laugh… Ha Ha Ha!

Laughter is wonderful and marvellous… yet, it’s a moment that dissipates quickly like steam clouds from a kettle. Like snowflakes on your tongue. Like a shooting star in an inky sky. Like losing my virginity. Gone…

But singing … yes, Mary Poppins loves to sing too!

Singing is a lasting memento that lingers and meanders and harmonizes … like a light tongue lick across your soft shoulder skin that tingles and teases and melts down through your body to the nether regions of dark deliciousness.

Sorry, where was I?

Kids love to sing. Dogs and coyotes love to sing.

I love to sing… I’ll bet you do too…

People just love to sing…

I sing by myself in the car … I sing in the shower … I sing solo at Open Mics … I sing in duets on various stages here in the Okanagan Valley. I’ll sing anywhere.

Sometimes people listen, sometimes they don’t. Doesn’t matter (I lied, it does!). Singing transcends ego.

Me, Nancy and Jimmy in Yellowknife’s Hoist Room. 1978.

In Yellowknife, I sang Valdy and CSN songs with Jimmy and Nancy and Steve in the Arctic bars; in William’s Lake I sang Dylan songs in Cowboy Country coffeehouses with John; today I sing Civil Wars and Willie Nelson songs with Marie and David.

My earliest memories of singing were in Grade 6 at Glen Brae Middle School in Hamilton, Ontario.

I sang in Mrs. Laing’s class choir… my friend Danny and I both loved harmonizing- at lunch break we’d rush over to the Millionaire Drive-Inn (best Vanilla milk shakes ever!) and buy a root beer and a 25¢ burger wrapped in tin foil, before running back to practice with the group. We sang Love Is Blue (L’Amour Est Bleu). Simple harmony parts but it was beautiful.

I wonder if Danny still sings somewhere out there today?

My daughter went out to sing last night … Vancouver’s Vogue Theatre was jammed with 1,000 enthusiastic strangers filled like feathers in a pillow to the peak of the balcony … every single person there singing their hearts out for one night … belting out DANCING QUEEN … young and sweet, only seventeen …oooooo oooooooo.

CHOIR! CHOIR! CHOIR!

In a few months my sister in Ontario will be having the same CHOIR! CHOIR! CHOIR! experience (except a different song I’m sure). Communal singing in sheer joy.

My daughter and sister aren’t unusual.

It used to be that adult choirs were typically associated with churchgoers. That’s still true to a certain extent but general community choirs are rising like fervent yeast in a warm cozy kitchen. Everyone loves to sing and harmonize.

Singing is the like the mellowing effects of legal cannabis, an infusion of the perfect tranquilizer, the kind that soothes your nerves and elevates your spirits.

Endorphins and oxytocin don’t only emanate from the runner’s high that carried the Boomers through the ’70’s and ’80’s.

Singing releases these “feel good” hormones too. That explains why a number of studies have found that singing lessens feelings of depression and loneliness.

The great thing about choir singing is you can really suck at it and no one knows. My wife, who could be described as lacking “perfect pitch” but charged with lots of vocal enthusiasm, joined a Sweet Adelines chorus years ago and her voice became subsumed and absorbed into the blender of voices. What is better than that?

All sorts of people with terrible voices sing at Karaoke bars because … well… it’s fun, it’s merry, it’s joyous – to use an old expression… it’s gay … even without 10 B-52 shooters on board.

Singing is cheaper than therapy, healthier than drinking, and less sweat inducing than working out.

Singing immerses us in the waters of our past with small tidal fragments of memories, ripples of happiness and melancholy … all the things that make us real and human.

Yes, singing is the one thing in life where feeling better is pretty much guaranteed … where darkness is shaded out by light, depression pushed down and away, smiles made brighter and broader…

… and Mary Poppin’s kites fly higher and higher in the sweet gentle air of endorphins.

Oscar and The Side Effects That Might Make You A Better Person

 

AStarisBornBlackKKlansmanBohemianRhapsody

BlackPantherGreenBookRoma

TheFavouriteVice

Frankly Scarlett, it’s almost Oscar time again.

I can’t wait to tear up during the In Memorium section. I love the melancholy, the bittersweet.

I’ve seen slightly more than half the 2019 Best Picture nominees so far, and it’s a rich crop this time around the sun.

But which movie made me a better person?

Aside from the sheer entertainment value of watching a great movie, what are the lingering side effects?

Over the years, I’ve learned not to eat a sandwich in a New York restaurant next to Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal. I’ve learned that to escape the claws of police after a bank heist, one needs only race across the next State border (why a Canadian should know this is another question) in a depression-era Model T Ford. I’ve learned that a chance encounter with a famous drunken country rocker can lead to untold fame and wealth (but ultimate sorrow).

But should movies have side effects? Not hangovers and tummy aches but … positive side effects?

Of course they should. We pay money to see these artistic creations. There’s gotta be more than awe and catharsis and greasy popcorn fingers.

We often read books with the conscious notion of becoming more intelligent, rounded, complete people. We grow and become better people with each chapter consumed.

Should movies be any different?

Most films are like reading a trashy novel on the beach. Tawdry and easily defecated out the back door of the theatre as we leave.

But … some … some movies are epic and long-lasting, unforgettable, priceless and timeless in their message and format. Like a great song, they get inside your head and linger like the aroma of a beautiful bolognese sauce simmering on the stove.

A couple of positive side effects? Examples?

I watched A Star is Born where Bradley Cooper (Jackson Maine) knocks Lady Gaga (Ally) out of her sleepy repose:

Look, talent comes everywhere, but having something to say and a way to say it so that people listen to it, that’s a whole other bag. And unless you get out and you try to do it, you’ll never know. That’s just the truth. And there’s one reason we’re supposed to be here is to say something so people want to hear. So you got to grab it, and you don’t apologize, and you don’t worry about why they’re listening, or how long they’re going to be listening for, you just tell them what you want to say.

That is a reminder, a reinforcement of a life lesson. The raw ingredients … talent, ability, intelligence are only the first steps to making a statement. Delivering that statement with confidence and balls, courage and sustained effort is what is needed.

Green Book is a Shakespearean adventure where the “Fool” Bronx-born Tony Lip learns lessons of the world from his “colored” employer Dr. Don Shirley. In turn, Tony reflects back some unconventional teaching moments that inform the life of an “educated” man:

Dr. Don Shirley: Pull over.
Tony Lip: What?
Dr. Don Shirley: Pull over.
Tony Lip: I ain’t pulling over!
Dr. Don Shirley: Stop the car, Tony!
[Tony stops the car and Don gets out and starts walking in the rain]
Tony Lip: What? What are you doing?! Doc? Doc, what the hell are you doing? Doc, get back in the car!
Dr. Don Shirley: Yes, I live in a castle! Tony. Alone! And rich white people pay me to play piano for them, because it makes them feel cultured. But as soon as I step off that stage, I go right back to being just another n****r to them. Because that is their true culture. And I suffer that slight alone, because I’m not accepted by my own people, because I’m not like them either! So if I’m not black enough, and if I’m not white enough, and if I’m not man enough, then tell me Tony, what am I?!

Classic.

The side effect message? To make something special, something great, we have to accept the possibility of setting ourselves apart from our comfortable world. There is a bitter price to be paid for the exceptional.

How about the flamboyant Freddie Mercury? Bohemian Rhapsody?

Filmmaker Bryan Singer presents Mercury’s father as having been disappointed with his son’s penchant for nightlife and theatricality, urging him over and over again to get serious about his life and follow his refrain:

“Good thought, good word, good deed.”

Mercury ends up living by his dad’s words, but in his own way. In one scene, the mercurial singer tells a potential manager that Queen is the champion of the oddball: “We’re misfits who don’t belong together, playing for the other misfits. The outcasts. The ones right at the back of the room. Who are pretty sure they don’t belong either. We belong to them.” His good thought, word and deed, in other words, is for them — the stigmatized, marginalized and misunderstood.

Finally, eventually, Mercury’s father seems to recognize that his son has lived up to his expectations in their last interaction on screen. Mercury goes home to introduce his family to his boyfriend, Jim Hutton, who remained his partner until the singer’s death from AIDS-related complications at 45, and tell them about his plans to perform in a charity concert (Live Aid) to raise money for famine relief in Africa.

“Good thought, good word, good deed.

Just like you taught me, Papa.”

The resulting theme from each of these flicks? The life lesson? The side effect that can make you better?

It’s simple. Occam’s razor simple.

No matter the “size” of one’s existence, greatness is a Herculean struggle. To be better tomorrow than you are today takes effort and strain and pain.

It takes a sizable tub of popcorn to impart these side effects into my brain, because…

… Frankly dear, I do give a damn!