Decisive Power

Posted on April 22, 2011 by Tom Trimbath

People impress me. Most of us are able to run our lives much more efficiently than the government is able to run the country. It’s not the government’s fault. It was drawn up that way. Legislators must choose between yes and no, and there are greater incentives for saying no. To get through a normal day, regular people have to say yes to something, and many times no is not an option.

Thank you to everyone who worked on the Constitution. I know you’re all gone by now, but I thank you anyway. I think it is due for a revision, just like any bit of writing. (There’s too much ambiguity and too many anachronisms, why else do we argue about the Second Amendment so much?) It was a great improvement over every other form of government in the late 1700s.

Unfortunately, Congress is driven by arcane rules that operate around votes of either yes or no, with a few abstentions. Yes represents a commitment to action, a decision to follow a course. But nothing is certain, so failure and unintended consequences can ruin political careers. Yes can make the world a better place, but it requires legislators and senators to be personally responsible. No is a much easier vote. No allows for righteous indignation, noble defenses against government spending, political maneuvering, and I-told-you-so.

Real lives are driven by choices. Eating is not a yes or no option. Either you have enough or you don’t. If you have enough, then yes is implied and the vital action is choice and a decision. At least that’s true for me. I’ve never said yes to everything on the menu, or cooked everything in the pantry and refrigerator. Jobs, transportation, housing, education, and recreation are long lists of choices and consequences.

By the way, for those that don’t have enough, government’s no’s mean even fewer choices.

Most Americans excel at making decisions. Visitors can be overwhelmed by our menus, multiplexes, supermarkets and shopping malls. I’ve known some of them to simply surrender and ask a local to make the decision for them.

I’m not going to get into the wisdom of some decisions because sometime we’ve each picked the wrong option, gone down the wrong path, picked the wrong words. It is too easy to be judgmental.

Instead, I want to emphasize the skills we have. Our ability to make decisions is an under-appreciated skill. Fortunately it is a skill that immensely powerful. Deciding what’s going to happen is much more powerful than just saying yes to whatever will happen, or saying no in an attempt to keep everything from changing. People who are good at frugality or investing understand choices and decisions. They recognize that there are more choices available than what they first see, and they realize that their choices affect their lives. It is a powerful way to live and it is a power that is available to everyone, even people who feel powerless.

Part of my pessimism is produced by the yes or no culture and processes within our government. The government doesn’t have to be constrained by only yes or no, but it seems powerless and doesn’t realize that the very document that established the government also established mechanisms to change and improve.

Part of my optimism is produced by the people that recognize their power to choice the life and world that they want to live in. There’s a famous (and disputed) quote from Margaret Mead:
“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”
I also like the corollary to it which is to imagine what would happen if there were so many small groups that agreed that they represented a majority. We The People then embodies impressive power.

I’ll put global issues aside though because individual choices are more powerful. Deciding to live more frugally, deciding to invest actively and possibly in each other, results in benefits at a personal level. Abstractions and ideologies are inconsequential compared to people living healthier and more sustainable lives within healthier and more sustainable communities.

We, you and I, have these powers. We simply have to decide to use them. Thanks to those that do.

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Electric Parties

Posted on April 20, 2011 by Tom Trimbath

I am not addicted to Facebook. I merely have it up whenever the computer is turned on. Well, okay, so I do post there a bit. I am not alone.

Facebook has over a half-billion active users. There are barely twice that many personal computers in use, and Facebook stretches into smartphones. Some lament the intrusion of technology. I celebrate the growth and pervasiveness of community. The electrons and electronics helped it happen.

Life on a rural island requires resourcefulness. When the snowstorm trapped people in their homes, or at least made them decide to not drive anywhere, people got busy on Facebook with lots of posts, pictures, and shared stories. There were even a few 4WD favors as some ventured to the store for others. When we’re warned about tsunamis, notices, links, and offers of safe havens are passed along.

Facebook is not alone.

We’re surrounded by the Salish Sea, so orcas and grey whales do laps around the island, but they are elusive. Want to find the whales? Lots of locals email whale reports to one central unofficial and effective authority: the Orca Network. (Donations appreciated.) Their baby announcements are particularly well received.

Drew Kampion, penultimate surfer and sage, produces a daily set of emails that cover the island’s classes, freebies, art shows, jobs, and other innovative connections. It’s like craigslist, but much less structured, which is good for our community of free-form lifestyles. (Donations appreciated again.)

I’m even on Twitter now (@tetrimbath). Adding another network felt overwhelming, so I postponed joining until recently. Now that I’ve joined I get it. I see why and how it can help and be used.

I joined LinkedIn too, but that one doesn’t seem to be as active and useful – yet.

Of all of the titles I list in my bio, “Writer, Speaker, Teacher, Photographer, Engineer, Entrepreneur, etc.”, networker is missing unless you read between the letters of etc. Networking is not a job, but it is an occupation. It occupies my time because I enjoy people. I’m both and extrovert and an introvert. As I’ve said in other places:
If people see my extroverted side, they might not believe I need quiet time. If they see my introverted side, people might not believe that I enjoy people, public speaking and throwing parties.

I prefer to meet people in person. (Dancing is much more fun that way.) The majority of communication is non-verbal. Phone calls miss body language, but at least capture intonation and emphasis. Emails allow for revision and review, but miss human cues. Video chats probably get around a lot of that, but I haven’t tried that yet; though I remember very jittery video-conferences where I concentrated on my notes so I wouldn’t get nauseous from the electronically spastic images.

Until the telephone, almost all human communication was immediate. The other person wasn’t an abstraction. They were within arm’s reach, which encouraged manners and politeness. Hugs were encouraged. Insults didn’t initiate flame wars; instead, insults may have initiated bruises.

Technology has frequently been feared, yet with education and wisdom, it is accepted and used. Computers were invented to help with the census and artillery barrages, not free music sharing as one person adamantly asserted. Email was developed to allow academics and the military to pass along data and messages, particularly across a battle damaged network. Facebook was for dating. Blogs were a way for admins to track and record system performance issues across shifts. As for LinkedIn and Twitter, maybe they’re actually being used according to their original designs. It happens.

We are social creatures, and we live in an era when we can be aware of global problems while also be reaching out to larger communities than ever existed. I am encouraged because we’re taking tools and using them to build connections, networks populated by us, despite initial intentions.

Someone passed along a party analogy for these various media. Email is like handing a letter to a friend – who has a massive copy machine that they may or may not use. A message on Facebook is like walking up to someone and passing them a note. Posting on someone’s wall on Facebook is like walking into a party of friends and shouting something across the room. Maybe everyone will listen, many folks will probably nod and ignore it. Twitter is like buying a headline, and the number of your followers determines whether it is a headline in the New York Times or in some newsletter. And blogs are more like freelance journalism, but without the editors or paychecks.

Whatever technolgy’s intent, it is a tool that with wisdom and practice can save time and money, while improving our social lives. We are impressively connecting up, building networks, and reaching across borders. It might just be a way to find a cheap car, or to find out if it’s safe to drive out of the neighborhood, but it’s result is a wider, more pervasive society. We may see fewer people in a day, but we are less alone – and I think we are heading to a much bigger community, and a much better party. Thank you electrons. (Ben Franklin never saw this coming.)

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Show Up

Posted on April 16, 2011 by Tom Trimbath

The folks that show up may not have signed up. The folks that signed up may not show up. That explains the traffic on the dance floor last night. At the urging of others I reserved a table for dinner for dancers. By the time the band started it was obvious that the reservations were mostly worthless. The seats were all taken, but with a different cast. Exacting reservations weren’t as important as the fact that the folks who showed up had fun.

Showing up is powerful. Retire and become valuable. Every charity will be happy to take your time. They’ll be happy to take your money too, but there’s always work that needs to be physically finished. I save time for volunteering, sometimes digitally (e.g. as Secretary of The New Road Map Foundation), sometimes as grunt labor (e.g. as one of the fence-building, blackberry-whacking, site stewards for Whidbey Camano Land Trust). Cheap labor is worth a lot to an organization with more work than money or people.

Showing up for yourself is self-empowering. I’ve learned, and am learning, to show up for myself. Great philosophies center on self-less behaviour. Ultimately, that probably proves out to be true, but charity also begins at home, and I have plenty of internal personal projects to complete before I devote myself to a monastic life or dive into a world of self-less service. Before I can become sustainably altruistic I have to take care of myself.

It’s Saturday, so one way I am showing up for myself is to sit and sell. It’s the Saturday Art Show at Bailey’s Corner that I described last week. My photos and books are racked, displayed and priced. I’ve already had one interested customer, interested, but not paying, yet. It’s a few hours of tending my photos, practicing my writing (via this blog), and practicing photographing a new environment (indoor candids of patrons, artists and our host, glass artist Paul Petersen). Learning to type with chilled fingers may be a useful skill, but for now it’s just a nuisance.

This is definitely not just a way to kill time. If I wanted to do that I’d find a warmer activity. Being this cold can also be fun, if I’m skiing or hiking. Maybe I’ve met an artist that started creating to fill the time, but such an approach dies quickly. Art takes effort, especially in ways that never show up in the final product. Shopping for framing sales, Helping fellow artists move. (Boxes of rocks should not be packed on top of boxes of feathers.) Taxes, licensing, advertising, web maintenance, and association dues are hassles and expenses but they are worth the cost for someone who has found a passion.

Showing up is not a guarantee of anything. But not showing up has a very high likelihood of not succeeding.

Woody Allen is frequently quoted as saying, “Eighty percent of success is showing up.” Pardon me as I paraphrase an earlier post: In Freaknomics, the authors Levitt and Dubner point out that many successful people, whatever success may be, frequently achieve it through persistence. Maybe if I persist in repeating that the thought will sink in. A more specific variant is Malcolm Gladwell’s 10,000-Hour rule (from his book Outliers). My understanding is that, while neither failure nor success is guaranteed, and while luck plays a large role, successful people tend to reach that success after about 10,000 hours of effort. Devote about twenty hours a week for about ten years and you’ve practiced for 10,000 hours.

Spending twenty hours a week on anything is hard, and difficult to wrap around a forty-hour workweek. Family and friends will notice.

For retirees, ten thousand hours can be intimidating because of the apparently late start. Retirees though may have already accrued hours. I retired from engineering just over a decade ago. It wasn’t until years later that I wrote my first book, and even later before I started selling my photos. But looking back I realize that both my writing and my camera work really began in junior high. While I worked in a cubicle I trivialized my teenage efforts because they were what I did as a kid and had nothing to do with aerospace engineering. Now I recognize that my junior high work led to practicing via the high school newspaper, aided my college essays, continued developing through corporate communications including organizing photo shoots, and finally had a chance to be tended and grown after I handed in my Boeing badge.

I won’t label myself as a success because using that label here entwines with your definition. I do know that some have called me a successful writer and artist, and I appreciate their compliments. Inside my head and heart I don’t use the word. My main measures are to be pleased with my work, for it to serve others somehow, and for me to make progress with deeper, clearer and more concise self-expression. Of course, it would be very handy to make more money from my efforts. More money would help me produce more and better work. Financial success as an artist would also ease many conversations with people who want to ask how my art is doing without dredging up starving artist stories. (I may not have “enough” but I’m not starving. Go check DNDN and MVIS, but maybe skip over AMSC.)

Retirement doesn’t mean doing nothing. It does mean I can finally spend the time showing up, getting things done, giving serendipity more chances to walk through the doorway, giving me time to relax as I watch for good opportunities to come by, and by giving me time to make mistakes and fix them. I get to help myself, others, and the world; frequently, in ways I can’t predict or necessarily understand.

It’s been a treat and a surprise to learn that I’ve been showing up for longer than I knew. Thinking back, I started dancing in college. It turns out that showing off as a teen-ager was the start of showing up as an adult.

PS Hey! Scatchet Sunset just sold! Yeah. She bought the autographed copy, a one-of-a-kind.

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Restless Society

Posted on April 13, 2011 by Tom Trimbath

Retire. Relax. Take the time to wander around town and watch the world go by. If I did too much of that I’d gain too much weight and lose too much money. We talk about slowing down our frenetic society, but there’s little in place to let it rest.

Yesterday I made a calendar mistake. I did a few chores around the house but soon left to meet a friend for lunch, head off to a lesson, and run a string of errands before ending the evening by dancing. It was going to be a full day of disassociated events well scheduled and arranged. It turned out to be a practice run and an exercise because I got the day right but the week wrong. Most of that was scheduled for next week, which left me feeling sheepish and looking for something to make of the day.

I could’ve returned home after having a rare solo lunch date, but the sun was burning away the clouds and I found myself in a warming spring day. It looked like it might even creep up to air that felt almost like April. Most of my small household chores were done. The lawn was mowed. There was nothing I could do to suddenly make the garden grow. The rest of the chores were too big for just an afternoon, especially if I was going to end up dancing. I decided to act the part of a retired person, or maybe a weekday tourist. That should be easy on Whidbey. The island’s demographic is graying and tourism is a major industry. It should be easy to kick back.

Kicking back does work, but for the most part a place to comfortably and simply sit usually takes money, calories, or outdoor attire. I’d just had lunch, which was fine, but diners want diners to eat it and run. Free up the table for the next person, unless you want to have a dessert or two. The winter watched me gain enough weight to backslide a notch on the belt. I didn’t want dessert and I didn’t need something else to drink. I wondered around town for a while. Langley is a good town for that. It’s why tourists visit. Langley is small enough to walk around, but big enough to have plenty to see and do – unless it is a Tuesday before the main tourist season. In that case, many of my friends have picked the same quiet mid-week day to close their shops so they can rest up before the main sweep of business.

Sitting in some quiet bistro sounds quaint and relaxing, but again, I didn’t want anything to eat or drink. I could’ve bought something anyway and let it sit there on the table, effectively renting a spot for the price of a pint or a macaroon, but I don’t like wasting money or food. The library was open, but I tend to fall asleep there, they might not like that, and I don’t like to snore and drool in public. Beside, it probably wouldn’t be quiet. Libraries are no longer the sanctuaries of silence I remember from childhood. It isn’t worse, it’s just different, but I don’t feel relaxed listening to multiple halves of cell phone conversations, even if they are sotto whispered. (I’m sorry to hear about your father going into the hospital, and it’s good that you care, but I’ll be leaving now because I don’t need to hear the details of his surgery.) I suppose I could’ve dropped by a church, but I see them as places for worship for their parishioners, not for loitering by strangers.

We talk about slowing down the pace of life, yet we have laws against it. I was effectively trying to loiter. The laws may be there to combat hooliganism or as leverage to use for moving along homeless people, but the consequences have also worked against a more relaxed society. I sat in the park for a while on a hard bench, shivered a bit and saw the dilemma. If the park seating was more comfortable and sheltered from the wind and rain, it was be so attractive that it would be lived in. As much as I wanted a place to temporarily simply and comfortably sit, such a place would already be occupied or over-used.

If it feels like you are only really comfortable at home, in your car, or maybe even in your office with the door shut (for those few who actually have real offices), you might be right. The most comfortable place for me without going home was to go sit in my car. The seat was cushioned and the weather held away. It was even warm if I parked it in the sun.

This isn’t just a problem on Whidbey. I witnessed the same dilemma when I lived in suburbia, but there the issue was complicated by “No Parking” signs. Where do I put myself and my car in that environment? Oddly enough there is a place. It’s called the mall. No wonder so many seniors and kids wander about in the closed and comfortable confines of a suburban shopping mall.

Many talk about building community, yet there are few places where we’ve actually built structures that support it. Langley is working more towards that. It has a Commons. A local bookstore and coffeeshop that is aiming to be a community living room is run by students, so the energy is higher; and it’s well-designed and equipped, so it can be quite comfortable. They even hold events there, including some of my talks and slideshows.

Such places are rare. I bow to those who saw the need and contributed the resources that made it happen. It works in this small town environment, and is one example of what I like here that I don’t expect to find anywhere more urban. Larger places are more expensive and someone has to pay for it. A small town is more likely to find a passionate and understanding local philanthropist.

One solution is community based person-to-person interaction, the original P2P, which only requires two Ps, two people, who have the same time and interest in visiting with and talking with each other. Simply visiting friends fills the need. It’s probably the biggest challenge I’ve encountered by retiring early. Almost everyone else I know with a similar age and background is still at work. Almost everyone I know who is at home is either raising a family or is a senior citizen. My situation is under my own control, and I’ve found ways to stitch together community. Usually it works, buts somedays, maybe with just the slipped glance at the calendar, gaps form in the net. Then it is easy to see some of the unresolved disconnects and conflicts within my life and our society.

There are bigger problems to fix: global climate change, social injustice, unsustainable civilizations. I wonder though, how many resources are consumed, how much discontent is created, because we’ve yet to find a way to build and sustain simple places, and simple societies, within which we can rest.

Personally, it’s time now for me to slide into my comfy chair at home and watch the whales go by, whether they’re there or not.

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Show Art Sell Art

Posted on April 9, 2011 by Tom Trimbath

It’s Saturday morning which, until last week, meant wake up eventually, then breakfast and blog. As of last weekend, Saturday mornings became wake up early and devote hours to art, selling art. Or, from another perspective, getting to spend a day hanging out with artists, folk who don’t care about convention (unless it is about what is “art”), but who do care about exploration, innovation – and how to make a living from passion. An art sale blends idealism with realism. Here’s a bit of what it’s really like to be an artist.

Breakfast – It has to be hearty. It’s spring in the northwest. It snowed this week. Sitting beside my art for hours is not very active or warming, unless it happens from within. What a great excuse for a cheese omelet and bacon. Unfortunately, I had to give up wearing shorts for the day.

Packing – Prints, satins, books, racks, stands, and hanging hardware, are obviously going into the car. Chairs, plural, because I need the second one as a foot rest; plus food, a thermos of tea, the computer for blogging, the camera for practicing candids, and undoubtedly other paraphernalia that all unconsciously add up to about eight trips to load the car. Selling art includes the art of sitting back and letting the people browse and shop while being available. Computers are handy. I can focus on mine while surreptitiously watching the traffic, in other words, being productively sneaky. Practiced nonchalance involves as much material as the art. A mastery of zen might make it easier, but then maybe a zen master wouldn’t be selling anything material.

Setup – I’m lucky. Most of my art is on paper. Books and prints aren’t as fragile as the work being set up by sculptors, potters, and metalsmiths. Glass, ceramics, and thin metal can dent, bend, scratch, and shatter. My art merely wrinkles, and doesn’t weigh nearly as much. I could set up in about ten minutes, but socializing stretches it out to about thirty. I’m done before the event’s begun, because I got here early to get a good spot. That leaves about an hour of sitting and typing as others busy themselves before the public arrives. Cold fingers though.

Open – The door’s open! The garage door’s been open since we got here, which is why the air isn’t balmy. Oops. I brought the wrong satins. Oops. My first visitor noticed that the prints were put in the stand backwards. The first one was faced out, but the rest weren’t. Maybe I set up too quickly. The first sale of the day! One of the painters just moved to the area and this is her first show in Washington State. And she sold art. During a break in the traffic we all celebrate.

The kiln and furnace are firing up. Paul Petersen hosts this event in his studio as much out of community support as anything else. He sculpts in metal and glass, but the space he’s rented is larger than he needs. (Susan Jensen gets thanks too for her organizing skills.) We fill the rest. We haven’t decided whether we’re the show and he’s the sell or if he’s the show and we’re the sell. No matter.

Artists, in general, even if they are competing, support each other. There’s safety in numbers, and it gets better from there. Gaps in traffic are times for stories, suggestions, maybe a bit of gossip. Can they really knit a doily big enough to cover a police car? Who can entertain the eight year old the longest? Ouch, someone says as they singed their eyebrows as they got too close to the kiln. Where’d the traffic go? It must be time for the sketchers to start sketching. Sketching is the new trend.

Art, in general, is becoming a new trend, and not only for the sake of art. Baby boomers are retiring, and many of those who don’t revert via consultancy or dive into golf are becoming writers, photographers, painters, sketchers, sculptors, and weavers. Seattle’s lucky enough to have Daniel Smith Art Supplies. As Starbucks was to Denny’s, Daniel Smith is to Michael’s. Visits are made to the suburban store but pilgrimages are directed towards the main store in the Industrial District. Paints and papers, brushes and canvases, portfolios and easels pull in professionals and passionate enthusiasts. Within the writing world, the number of writers is increasing even as the number of readers is decreasing, though maybe the maturation of the e-book industry is turning that around.

Despite the drop in art education, younger folks are also turning to art independently. Partly it may be a frustration with jobs and available careers, but I think it is also because they are encouraged and enabled by digital media and communities. Their posts are going to be embellished with appealing graphics, videos, and words; entry arts into the more complicated addictions of three-dimensional physical art.

I think art is also appealing because it allows for expression, and many organizations and corporations have become bureaucratic, stifling creativity. Art doesn’t require bureaucracy. Self-expression can be judged by self. And if someone wants to buy it, the artist gets paid to make more. Jobs and careers may only deliver paychecks. Sold art generates self-esteem and revenue.

The sales part of the day is winding down. Sales happen. Compliments are more frequent. My photos have a very high compliment to sales ratio. We’ve all found new inspirations and ideas. Paul even succeeded at his first attempt at a new type of lamp. Big smile there. We’ve even spent some time as a real estate news center. Evidently people are shopping, getting ready to buy. Well, architecture is art too. (Check out Ross Chapin’s new book.)

Late news. Another Paul piece sold. Smile again.

Soon it will be time to tear down, pack up, and drive home to metamorphose into a dancer for tonight’s dance, yet another art, but just for the fun of it. Nothing to sell. No need to be showy. Lots to share, and that’s worth a lot.

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Windows and Doors

Posted on April 6, 2011 by Tom Trimbath

When one door closes, somewhere a window opens.

Within 24 hours, one bookstore requested copies of all of my books and another bookstore asked me to take back the ones they hadn’t sold. The books won’t even have to come into the house. They’ll stay in the car until I run an errand past the welcoming bookstore. Those two doors swung almost in unison.

Over the two weeks, my largest stock holding, DNDN, has risen about 20%, finally heading back towards my guesstimate of the buyout value of the company, which is a low evaluation considering the company’s potential. Just as that window opened, a big door slammed shut as my second largest holding, AMSC, dropped 40% overnight.

History and lives advance in slips and starts. Even the seasons are having a rough time progressing today. It’s April. I live near sea level, and it’s snowing outside. Spring’s advances have been swung back by a last blast of winter. Don’t worry. The rest of the area is outside this weather bubble. The Seattle area has a weather phenomenon called the Puget Sound Convergence Zone, which is a mobile micro-climate that leaves everything else dry except the slice of land beneath it. Five miles north and five miles south of here it’s sunny, or at least not snowing. It doesn’t change the fact that it’s gloomy here and now.

The Dismal Decade was one massive vault door slamming shut opportunities, unless you were a part of the military-industrial complex. With such a large door shut for so long, it can be hard to even remember where the windows are.

I think we’re heading into a better decade. We’ve all lived under a dark cloud for too long, but I think the storm is breaking. I don’t expect a golden era free of drama and trauma, but I do see progress. The general fight against disposable plastic is gaining traction, but the tsunami washed lives and entire cities into the ocean, and even if we did everything right, it is estimated that it will take decades or generations before sea birds are no longer accidentally feeding plastic to their chicks. A lighter looks like a fingerling, but neither the parent nor the chick can digest it. (Go check Midway Journey for a professional, artistic and informative description of how our plastic is ending up on Midway Atoll in the Pacific.)

Typically, I am an optimist, and like I’ve said before, sometimes I use this blog to convince myself of positive possibilities. If I can’t find solutions in the media, it’s time to create a new media. That’s why writing can be powerful. Something new can be created without much more than creativity, time, and in this case, a computer.

Some of my friends continue to pass through dark times, but even a few of them have been surprised to find that side businesses are drawing in useful revenues. I’m not as surprised. Entrepreneurs frequently fare well if they work at it long enough.

Books have inspired me, and one I haven’t mentioned much is The Millionaire Next Door, by Stanley and Danko. A favorite quote is:
“Interestingly, self-employed people make up less than 20 percent of the workers in America but account for two-thirds of the millionaires.”
Self-employed people have a power. When a door closes and they can’t find an open window, they might just get out a sledge hammer and make a new door.

Another, more recent, book is Freakonomics, by Levitt and Dubner. Near the end they point out that many successful people, whatever success may be, frequently achieve it through persistence. That persistence succeeds because it lasts long enough to give doors and windows enough time to open. The other trick is to then recognize the draft and see it as a good thing.

For too long it seemed that everything was doors closing. Things are opening again, but it is like airing out a house during a Seattle spring, long-closed doors and windows are opened for a few minutes, or an hour or so, but quickly shut again as another front moves through. Eventually though, I know that summer will arrive and there will be days when every door and window are opened and the breeze is welcomed in.

Until then I’ll make sure the heat’s on, cook up some comfort food, and maybe wash the windows so I can see what’s coming. I kid you not, but the snow’s stopped. The wind has died. And there’s a hint of sunshine on the far hill.

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Puzzle Fixes

Posted on April 2, 2011 by Tom Trimbath

This blog is about balancing life and money, mostly, usually, well at least that’s true within a lot of leeway. Blogs are good for open-ended musings. But I don’t expect that this blog, nor balancing life and money, to be fixes for everything.  They are all just parts of the puzzle.

I tackled a puzzle this week when I did my taxes. Six hours of work resulted in an amount owed that equaled the amount refunded, zero. That’s balanced. It’s also easier than it seems. Frugality has its benefits.

The less money I spend, the less I have to make, the lower my tax bracket, the less I have to spend in taxes, the less I have to make. Do you see how this is going? At some point deductions, allowances, and various losses take the amount due from capital gains and income and leave me owing nothing. Nothing withheld. Nothing to refund either.

The result was zero but the effort was significant. I hate filling out taxes. I rarely use the word “hate”, but I pull it out for a few things, including having to fill out official forms. Six hours of being casually walked through the numbers by TurboTax could have been effortless, but that zero cost me a massive headache, tightened muscles, and a strong need for a run, my karate exercises, some meditation, and a spiced martini.

Maybe I over-reacted. I suspect that I’m not alone. I don’t want to imagine how bad I would have felt if I tried working through the paper forms using the IRS tax guides. Hours probably would’ve stretched to days. The subsequent medications would have been stronger than any martini.

“Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s.” It was nice to give zero.

Believe it or not, I actually look forward to paying more taxes. Our government can’t run on fumes, and shouldn’t operate on massive debt; and while the government is massively inefficient, so are most charities. The real reason though is that if I am paying higher taxes it’s probably because I’ve made more money. Living frugal is fine, but I won’t turn down simultaneous, substantial wealth.

I’ve been wealthy, though I may not be now, as measured by my own criteria. Wealth can only be measured personally, which is good because it also means we each get to set our own goals. Claim success and you are successful.

Back in those wealthy days it was nice to actually send the US Treasury non-tax money to help pay off the debt. I don’t like the federal debt, but this is my country, and therefore my responsibility. We can fix this, but it probably involves many such individual efforts and probably the hiring of different managers.

People, businesses, and governments can have money problems. One trick is to remember that money is not the problem. Money is a resource. It is emotionless. One trap is to tie emotions to it. A famous misquote is “Money is the root of all evil.” The complete quote is, “The love of money is the root of all evil.” The emotion tied to money is the issue. Loving money is ill-advised. Hating money is unproductive. Fearing money is counterproductive too.

I know people who many would consider to be wealthy, but who deny the existence of their monies because of fear, upbringing, an excess of humility, or a repulsion from being considered a part of a “class”. They don’t want to be one of “them”. They discount the existence of their IRAs. Inheritances, pigeon-holed savings, windfalls, are left off the ledger when they calculate their net worth. Millionaires convince themselves to work extra decades because they don’t have “enough” even though their only true limit is self-imposed.

When I was wealthy there was plenty of money but there were plenty of problems. Health issues, family disputes, conflicting obligations, household repairs, garden and lawn maintenance, car upkeep all gave me more than enough to worry about. The wealth allowed fixes via money, but worries persisted. Being stranded in a winter storm on the Interstate was miserable no matter how much money or resources were available for eventually fixes. Hypothermia happens and money doesn’t warm well enough.

The main problems came from time spent on obligations that didn’t fulfill a life’s interest, that weren’t aligned with a life’s values.

Balancing money and life can’t be done with money alone. Time must be respected too.

Ignoring wealth wastes time. Decades spent chasing a few more dollars or company benefits are years of a life spent living someone else’s life and agenda, unless your career is your vocation. Statistics suggest that vocationally engaged careers are in the minority. There’s no fix for getting those years back.

I have an idea of how much time is worth for me. If nothing else, I know that spending $100 on tax preparation software was worth days of savings, and untold avoidance of stress-related health consequences.

My taxes balanced. My time and money were spent in balance. My responsibility is assuaged for another year. At least I’ve fixed that worry and that unfilled spot on my to-do list.

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Waiting For News

Posted on March 30, 2011 by Tom Trimbath

Waiting for good news. Remember good news? It has been known to happen. The Dismal Decade erased it from our short term memory, but as I recall there have been days to celebrate. There will be again. Here they come.

Cold Fusion was going to be this month’s good news, but it has been delayed until October. In the meantime, someone at MIT has developed a Solar Leaf, something about the size of a playing card that uses sunlight to split water into hydrogen and oxygen, which can then run a fuel cell; effectively making solar energy work at night. Solar cells in the daytime. Solar Leaves powering the night.

Dictatorships falling, not quietly like a tree in the philosophical forest, but noisily like real trees crashing down while opening the forest floor to light and new growth.

Businesses getting busy. It isn’t everywhere, but every week I hear about more friends having less free time because their businesses are busier, or because they’ve got a new job, or are chasing some new opportunity.

Japan, recovering, and while most are focusing on the nuclear issues, I keep in mind that the Japanese people continue to impress with the recovery from a massive quake and tsunami. They are doing what needs to be done, which is worth applauding. Their efforts are taken for granted, at least in the media.

Spring is arriving. Buds on the trees. Bunnies are chasing each other around my yard. The bald eagles and whales are hugging their respective sides of Whidbey’s shoreline.

I’m wearing shorts again. Oh wait, that happens year-round.

Dendreon is awaiting news too. Today, supposedly today, supposedly any minute, maybe even as I type, Dendreon (DNDN) should hear about reimbursement policies. Thrilling, eh?

Much of the good news we await comes in pieces. Bad news can be quick and traumatic. Good news, unless it is winning the lottery, seems to come in nibbles. Each element of the story held back, building tension and suspense, allowing pessimists to point and say “But it won’t clear this hurdle” and taxing optimists’ patience, persistence, and perseverance.

My stock spotlight is currently on Dendreon, but in the past the spotlight has hit other stocks in my portfolio. AOL, Starbucks, Pixar all performed well as companies and as stocks, but each bit of good news was always cautiously received because of gaps in their stories. AOL had great subscriber growth, but were the competitors coming on strong too? Starbucks (SBUX) continually surprised, but surely they wouldn’t be able to extend beyond Seattle, the West Coast, the coasts, North America, etc. Pixar could have stellar opening weekend box office receipts, but debates would ensue over production costs and merchandising possibilities.

I’m waiting for good news from my other lines in the water. I check my book and photo sales. I’m encouraged by those that want to take my classes. Networking is improving because of Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and good friends. I can’t know every possibility that results. I calmly add energies as “Smolinsky Moments” allow (aka serendipity, but really serendipity sounds dippy sometimes), but I also don’t try to control every tendril of potential good news. They probably don’t need my interference.

I’m also impressed with the news feed from Facebook and Twitter (@tetrimbath) because they give me views into friend’s daily celebrations. Rarely are the events large and significant in isolation, but they build into good news stories that should carry banner headlines. A scroll through a day’s posts reveals a menu of successes mini and major.

Looking past the bad to find the good is almost unstylish in some circles. I think if President Obama could deliver enough gold to pay off the debt and could discover cheap clean energy, he’d be chastised for inflationary measures, deflating the price of gold, and for driving coal miners out of business.

It has gotten to the point that when I hear bad news I wonder what good news they covered up. Didn’t coverups work the other way originally?

This just in, Medicare plans to cover Dendreon’s Provenge. Good news for patients, physicians, shareholders, and employees. Each of us is going to have to wait for the next bit. Where’s the patient on the waiting list? Which physicians have easiest access? Will the stock price go up on good news (not always the case)? Who gets which jobs in what is about to probably become a more dynamic and growing company? Everyone will have to wait a little while for their answers.

The rains are back. Good news for my plants. I wonder which ones will survive the bunnies, slugs and deer?

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Changing Corporations

Posted on March 26, 2011 by Tom Trimbath

If only changing corporations was like changing diapers. Imagine changing corporate culture by simply disposing of the messy bits, cleaning things up, and then hoping that a miracle happens and potty training was spontaneous. Corporations are changing, and while some of the evolutionary changes are welcome, some of the revolutionary changes are even better for innovation but maybe not so good for investors.

It is easy to forget, but corporations didn’t always exist. The idea of a corporation was an invention, just an idea that caught on. They’ve really only been around since the 1600s. The conquering Europeans landing in the New World predate pervasive corporate culture. International commerce spawned the concept as a way to spread risk and limit liability. Since then, the concept has evolved, but the core goal has remained: getting a bunch of people together to make money while reducing the chance of losing too much. It produced exploration, expansion and exploitation.

Under American governance, the goal was restated to “improve shareholder value”; and shareholder value was interpreted as maximizing the value, the wealth that each share represented. Each share of stock is treated equally (within a class of stock). The only way each shareholder is treated equally is if each shareholder held the same number of shares. Shareholders with more shares get more votes and it is possible for very few people, or even just one person, to control the fate of shares held by crowds of small investors.

Such a young system, young within anthropological timing, is bound to have flaws and imbalances. Evolution tweaks such entities and corporations have changed, usually through regulations that followed financial upheavals.

Our current system is flawed, but humans are imperfect and we could only devise a flawless system by chance. I’m willing to work within that system and invest within it because, for the most part, it works well enough. And I eagerly await stringent enforcement of the regulations and at least a few subtle yet pervasive modifications that could dramatically reduce society’s risk exposure. How about: shareholders only get to vote after they’ve held the stock for a year and a day, which would radically slow down corporate raiders. How about: require at least one human to be involved in each transaction, which would severely cripple flash trades. How about: eliminating naked short sellers, which sounds like naked shorts cellars, which actually isn’t as bad as the real thing, but is a topic too convoluted for me to go into here.

Corporations are a product of our social environment, and human environmental forces do not always require evolutionary changes. Revolutions happen too. At one time the concept of a corporation was revolutionary. Today there are new revolutionary concepts. I welcome them while recognizing that they may undermine my method of investing.

If you think you’re upset about the machinations of Wall Street, you might be surprised to learn that many wealthy people are even more upset. Unhappy people produce change. Within the realm of corporate America there are public companies (the kind we buy stock in) and private companies (corporations that are taken off the market). Are you wealthy and fed up with Wall Street hyenas? Buy up a public company, take it private, and run it the way you think best. (Playboy)

Did you create a company? Is it doing so well that it doesn’t need financing? Then there’s little reason to take it public. Some of the largest companies in the world are privately held. (Bechtel)

Did you foster an idea that is sustaining itself without having to chase profits? Then maybe you don’t need to turn it into a business. (wikipedia)

Maybe you run a company and want to redefine “shareholder value”. In that case you can turn your company into a b-corp, a new type of corporation recently legitimized in several states.

There’s even a revolution in entrepreneurship that ignores size, growth, and longevity. Kiosk companies, temporary incubators, flash firms are based on the idea of quickly creating, developing, producing, and selling a product, and then possibly closing down the business before it gets stodgy. Wired Magazine just ran an excellent article on Kickstarter, which I am exploring.

Maybe large corporations are no longer the most efficient means for production and wealth creation, though more properly, a few large corporations are providing the infrastructure for crowds of innovators to become entrepreneurs. Within the last several days I learned that my publisher would not be able to able to make my book, Dream. Invest. Live., available for Kindle. Amazon, the bookstore, the hardware provider, and the enabler, created a process where I was able to reformat the book myself. Uploading the right version of the Word document (which did take some experimentation to find) and a bit of patience and my book is now available for Kindle – and one less company was involved.

There was much talk two years ago about restoring our faith in the economy. Vast sums went to conventional institutions and organizations. I’m seeing the innovations outside those bounds, and many of those alternatives to public companies are happening in forms that are difficult to invest in. If that trend continues, stock investing may become an anachronism.

For now, I’ll keep my stocks. I’m hoping for significant evolutionary changes, and I won’t be surprised if the corporate changes are bigger because the companies became smaller. That would be revolutionary.

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Turtle Investing

Posted on March 23, 2011 by Tom Trimbath

It was fun writing the chapter: The Investment Zoo, in my book, Dream. Invest. Live. (which is finally available on Kindle, yea!)
“Lots of news stories make it sound like there are only bulls and bears, but there are also wolves, vultures, turtles, hummingbirds, elephants, church mice, . . . ”
Lately I’ve been feeling like a turtle slowly walking through a storm, keeping my head tucked in, and only poking out when I need to nibble.

Bull markets and bear markets are up markets and down markets. They are also generalizations, and just like with people, generalizations are always inaccurate. People and everyday life are defined by unique details that only match generalizations by chance. I enjoyed matching analogies of hummingbirds to day-traders and elephants to institutions. I’ll leave those detailed descriptions to the book. Within my view of the investment zoo, turtles can be those investors that keep their heads down, tend to be solitary, make slow steady progress, and survive because of a defense that protects them during tough times. They don’t grow quickly. They don’t move quickly. They aren’t flashy. They definitely aren’t noisy. And they can be easily overlooked.

My portfolio has not been a happy place this year. The companies I’m invested in have been doing very well, but the bull market has been growing the larger and more well-known stocks, that was until the world was hit with an unseasonable series of unrests and disasters. Even the broad markets have retreated. The companies represented by my two biggest holdings (AMSC & DNDN)  have reported good business growth and are properly positioning themselves to accelerate their revenue growth. In one case that is good news for energy (AMSC). In the other case it is good news for cancer treatments and patients (DNDN). Both stocks started the year undervalued (in my opinion) and have declined. In particular, DNDN has dropped just as I was relying on it to pay bills. I can still pay them, but it takes more shares than I prefer. I’m having to nibble my way through my bills. Good thing that I live a frugal life.

Dendreon recently received FDA approval for its prostate cancer treatment, Provenge. This year the company announced that the treatment works better than previously thought, that they were expanding into Europe without having to share profits here or there, and that they were accelerating the building of more facilities within the US. In rough numbers they made about $40 million in 2010, will probably make about $400 million in 2011, may expand to $1.2 billion after the facilities are operating in 2012, and will more than double that if they successfully treat the European market. They have a potential for a $4 billion revenue stream from Provenge alone. And it looks like the same technology can work against a half dozen other significant cancers. Revenue growth of a hundred-fold and the stock has gone down, ostensibly as they wait for the Medicare authorities to finalize their reimbursement strategies – even though the company is almost running at capacity even without that.

American Superconductor has a similar story: a disruptive technology with few competitors and revenues steered towards accelerated growth, with a declining stock.

Right or wrong, unfortunate for me or not, such disconnects between company prospects and current stock prices are more common amongst small companies. That’s why I buy their stocks, when I can. It’s why it is difficult to be an investor relying on their value to fund a lifestyle. It’s why, at times like this, I become a turtle of an investor.

There are herds of investors that have been spooked into stampeding. The predators like it when the prey run. The media sells drama, not rational thought. Unrests and disasters are traumatic events. For some companies, they are catastrophic. For many people such events are final. Those are the stories we see in the news, and for good reason. Knowing about tragedy is one way we exercise compassion. But a perspective is also necessary. I know many people who are worrying about radiation from Japan. If you have the time and sense of humor I recommend chasing yourself around this chart from a most excellent geek cartoonist (xkcd). Most of the things in the news don’t impact most lives.

As a turtle, I mosey along as I keep my goals in mind, poke my head out to check my progress, graze as required, avoid stampedes, and watch for the clouds for the break in the storm.

The companies that I’m invested in look like they’ll succeed. I hold enough stock in enough companies that I should have “enough” and probably more, maybe not today, but eventually. I’m not one of those investors who gets spooked out of the market, simply because I am not one of those investors who thinks I can guess the right time to jump in as the storm will passes. Being late on such timing misses much of the benefit. I invest for the long term, and in the long term I have been reasonably successful because enough of the companies that I’ve invested in have succeeded and become noticed.

I thought that over the last twelve months DNDN would be worth two, three or four times today’s price. I actually think it is worth that, but unfortunately the price has actually gone down 15% despite good news and real revenues. Maybe “they’re” right. Maybe I’ll be right.

In the meantime, I’ll slowly nibble my way across the investment landscape, keeping in mind that the turtle analogy is not immutable. As the sun comes out and the world gets brighter, I’ll be able to step outside the shell and change into something swifter, freer, and more exuberant. Okay guys, in my head I’m cuing up “Fly Like An Eagle“.

(Side note: I’ll be talking about my kindle experience in my Modern Self-Publishing class scheduled for April 23rd. Send me a note if you want to attend. tetrimbath@whidbey.com)

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