Drown My Sorrows

I like to think that I am an average Canadian. I can be pretty sure that I’m not above average, never having made any significant mark on modern society. I watch below average people all of the time driving on the road, shopping in stores and generally getting in the way pretty much everywhere. Not their fault, a fish swims, a pig rolls in mud and a dog sniffs; that is just God doing His mysterious ways.

I worked most of my life, raised a family, contributed to society as best I could and now I am enjoying retirement. I suppose that I am above average in having fallen into a job that forced me to contribute to a pension plan which allows me to be comfortable in my golden years. It would be nice if there were more gold of course, but what can you do.

For most of my life I have been listening to music on the radio, at work, in cars, at home and often in between places. I like to have some noise in the background, it means that all is normal and I am functioning well. Radio is the easiest to access so that is what I listen to most. There is TV when I am at home as well. Fortunately or unfortunately along with the music and TV shows there is the news of the day being reported. I am not really a joiner so most of the news that comes my way is very ignorable. Rarely does it have any effect on my life at all.

Sure, every now and then taxes go up a miniscule amount, a storm is predicted to blow through the area, some sporting franchise will or will not win “The Cup”. Mostly it will be a “who cares” moment or a time to get that cup of tea.

In every newscast and every ten minutes on the radio there is stock market news. Usually the stock market is up, but sometimes it is down. Often it will be up because it wasn’t as down as had been predicted or visa versa. Oil loses a dime her or a dollar there, sometimes it gains. The price will drop because there is too much and the next day there will be a shortage so the price has to go up again. The Canadian dollar continues to drop in relation to the US buck. That is supposedly good for the Canadian economy but somehow the stocks keep dropping. A low dollar sucks for the average citizen that wants to vacation in the US because everything is 30¢ per dollar more expensive. The Tech stocks are on the way up, unless they are on the way down. The bank that earned a 6 billion dollar profit in the first quarter had its stock price drop because they had predicted a 6.3 billion dollar profit. It is insane.

The point I am trying to get to in my round about way is that I just don’t give a shit! I don’t have a large portfolio of shares and stocks that need me to keep track of them on a daily/hourly basis. Even if I did have a bunch of stocks I trust the guy who invested for me to look after them. If I did have my money invested I would have selected long term investments so that I wouldn’t develop ulcers trying to keep track of the other kind. I know there are people that do track their money, but I doubt those people are getting their information from KISS FM or 95.7 The ROCK.

I know that my pension is invested in all sorts of stocks, money markets, foreign exchanges and other vehicles that hopefully will continue to make money so that I will continue to receive my monthly pittance. My RRSP’s go up, go down but over the long term they have gone up. Not as much as a good bottle of wine would have, but I can’t drink my RRSP’s. I just don’t need to hear how the stock market is doing every ten minutes on the radio and every night on the news. I can’t really do anything about it and I suspect most people are like me. The rich people have people who pay attention to that stuff and the poor people are too worried about eating and putting clothing on their kids to worry about investments.

If you worry about this stuff, you should put the money in a bank account and protect your stomach lining from being eaten away. I think I just may invest in wine, it will go up in value over the years and if it doesn’t I will be able to drown my sorrows.