Saturday, February 11, 2012

Blowing Bubbles: An Intensely Personal Review

An intensely personal review of the article The Great American Bubble Machine by Matt Taibbi. It is not recommended bedtime reading.


He handed me the article at bedtime. "You should read this," he said. When he recommends things, I usually listen. He has impeccable taste in reading. The title sounds like fun, but I know it's not. Not fun at all. I read the first few paragraphs and have to stop. "I can't read this before bed," I tell him. "It will make me dream of horrid things." I don't like to go to bed angry.

We live in our own bubble. From the inside, we see the world through irridescent soap shine - scrubbed and pretty, all glossy-bright and warped by our happy walls. Inside we float, bouncing off each other, protected. There are other bubbles that people speak of, but they are not our own. Or so I like to imagine. He helps me maintain our bubble, keep it from glancing off blades of grass or clapping toddler hands. He knows how important it is to me. He knows it's for our monkeys who are too young to think of things like Wall Street or the housing market. Money, to them, is two dollars and fifty cents a week. Fifty cents to charity, two dollars of financial freedom to save or spend. This is all they know. This is what they should know. They should not know of other money just yet. The money that equals power, corruption, usury, division and inequity.

"He's the new Hunter Thompson," he tells me of the author. Big words coming from the man who spent our one and only trip to Las Vegas, tripping in the steps of Fear and Loathing. (Not literally tripping, like the late Mr. Thompson, just visiting.) Nerdy vacation habits aside, this man I love is educated in political science, history, the law. He's also educated in a different way - in the ways of small people with large hearts, the ways of a soul mate with odd notions, the ways of being Daddy and Husband and keeping the wolves at bay. He's the pragmatist to my idealist. He tells me things will be OK when I lather on about the State of Things. He tells me that These Things come and go. I trust him because my mind is full of other things than history. He tells me, "You should read this," and I do.

I do not like what I read. I do not want to finish. It's too much to think about, too much to contradict. It makes me think of things like Goldman Sachs. Last week I didn't think of such things. I laugh and say it's a good thing we have no assets and then I worry about my mom, her entire retirement tied up in investments she doesn't fully understand. I don't understand how the large, imaginary money works. Technically, I do. I'm pretty smart that way. But in the center of me, I don't understand. I don't understand how there are people who not only cannot say "I have enough. I am content." but also seem content to take from those who have very little to begin with. I do not understand this and it makes me want to hug my kids, to hope their world continues to be two dollars and fifty cents every Sunday or some variation thereof.

There are so many things I read, I know. There are so many things I wish I didn't. I cannot fix those things. I cannot even begin to see clearly to the end of the problems. It cannot be solved with a swift kick in the shins, which is what I want to do. I laugh when I think of getting my common mud from my worn out boots on the perfect crease of a $2000 suit. But I cannot kick their shins, for my monkeys' sake. I can only keep my own bubble and make it work the best I can. I like to feel invisible, like no one can touch us. I like to feel aloft, afloat, swaying in the breezes that change.

Defeated at dinner last night, like I have not seen him about Such Things before, he tells me he's used up all his outrage for the day on the latest corporate bail-out. "A 'settlement' not a bailout! They're saying this!" He rages, "It is criminal, but it's not. It should be." The Hooligan expounds on broccoli and the jBird mimics her hero's fuming without knowing what it is she speaks of but maybe she does know: "Why can't people just share?" We do not usually talk like this in front of the kids. The fumes take up too much space inside our bubble. I raise my eyebrows at him and tell my jBird not to worry. He sighs, "I think it's come to the point where they're just looting the carcass."  These words from him chill and make my dinner suddenly unpalatable. This defeat, this portent of a world left picked clean by pillagers, leaving what? behind for the future that picks at its broccoli at my table.

These are the things I think about today, but they are out of my control. So we blow our bubble a little bigger: I bake bread with my son, I bring a surprise lunch to my daughter at school, I pound out these words, I play kickball, I go to the zoo, I blow those darker bubbles away from me - my quiet acts of peaceful rebellion. Today I cannot care about housing markets or tech stocks or golden parachutes. I am too busy investing in futures.

21 comments:

  1. Take this for a bubble. I am going to take your description of your husband, change the names, send it to my wife and ask her to send it back as a love letter. Immediately before you copyright the thing.

    PS. it is very easy to copyright stuff. A lawyer talking here. Just mail it to yourself and it is protected but for me, you are too late heeeee heeee.

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    1. You, my dear sir, are a pirate. But the most endearing kind. I give you my permission to copy my words and send them to your wife in an attempt to get her to send them to you. It is just twisted enough to work. Lest you forget, I am married to a lawyer and thus familiar with their wily and cunning ways.

      It wasn't until about a month ago that I even considered having written anything worth copyrighting. Also, I thought that old mail it to yourself trick didn't really hold up legally.

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  2. PS. thank you so much for the wonderful article. I have just finished reading John Kenneth Galbraith who wrote about the birth of the goldman sachs we know during the great depression and this new bit is essential reading. There is no use to get mad though. You must read Hayek.

    cheers.

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    1. You are quite welcome. I am assuming that you mean Friedrich Hayek and not Selma Hayek.

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    2. Oh come on--let's do an online book club and read Salma Hayek together! Can't we, please? It would be better for our mental health than some of these other options.

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  3. Sometimes I get so mad. I can't save the world. Just my world, but how is that enough? Bubbles are so fragile.

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    1. So fragile, but in spite of my ranting, I feel like I'm pretty well protected. I've got big friends in high places. ;)

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  4. I'd like to wrap our bubble in bubble wrap. Double the protection from all those out there with super sharp pencils.

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    1. The Hooligan would just stomp on all of the bubble wrap. I would probably help him, too. So much fun. I know what you mean, though.

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  5. I never used to be at all interested in politics, until probably 10 or so years ago when I dove in head first and haven't really come up for air since. Now I sometimes wish it was possible to "un-know" the stuff I learned. :( It's a whole lot easier staying inside our bubbles.

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    1. I have the opposite experience. I was extremely involved until about 7 years ago. I even campaigned with my newborn baby strapped to the front of me. But I found it was taking a lot of emotional toll on me and my fear grew relentlessly for these little people who live with me. It's hard for me to shut it out, because I truly am interested, but I find I take it all much more to heart since becoming a mom. So, given the choice between giving my emotional and intellectual energy to politics or my monkeys, it's a pretty clear choice for me. Still, stuff leaks in sometimes.

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  6. Your analogy is so real to me. I often feel like I am living in a bubble, hiding from the reality of the world, subject to wherever it's breezes blow me, with no control. I don't bother reading the news much because I know I can't affect much change anyway. The best I can do is focus on my children and raise them to be the change I hope to bring into this world by teaching them honesty, integrity, compassion, etc. I loved this post. It really speaks to me.

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    1. Sometimes I wonder if all of the people who are quietly outraged and minding their own business suddenly stood up and said "Enough!" what sort of change it would affect. Except that we are all too buys quietly minding our own business. Thank you so much for reading.

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  7. Oh hell, this is too much - I am so discouraged with the world - so friggin' discouraged. Your comment, "I don't understand how there are people who not only cannot say "I have enough. I am content." but also seem content to take from those who have very little to begin with" resonates so completely with me. But your impulse to hug your children is so opposite mine (which is to kick out every window in every big bank and stupid worthless big box store - those ones that feed the pitiful desire to acquire).
    Sorry. I have to watch my language - I did change one word....... but I am so discouraged. AND PISSED (is that a bad word anymore?)

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    1. Aw, JT. I know. If I let myself, that is my reaction too. Find something you love, that encourages you and hug it.

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    2. It would be nice if I could hug something but the impulse is to explode.... sadly, the rage cannot be funneled into a hug. Not anymore.

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  8. Focusing on the things you actually have control over is a brilliant way to live.
    Help who you can, when you can, how you can.... it takes a lot of little bubbles to make a yummy bottle of champagne. And who knows? The cork may pop beautifully in celebration at the end of a life well lived. Loved this post.

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    1. Thank you, darling! Sometimes I fight with myself about this. Am I just chicken? Willfully ignorant? Or managing my resources wisely? I tend to side with the latter notion. I like the idea of all these little bubbles in a bottle of celebratory champagne.
      xo

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  9. I've been on to Matt Taibbi since the coverage of the last Presidential election. He's brilliant, but terrifying and I must limit myself to small doses. I tend to go months without thinking about him and then grab a stack of Rolling Stones from the library and binge. I know it's all available online, but I fear that taking advantage of that easy access might really push me 'round the bend.

    Here's to our sacred bubbles and to doing what we can.

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    1. So, I saw two typos in the original comment. So I copied and pasted the original into a new comment and then posted it. Then instead of deleting the unfixed original, I deleted the fixed version. So, uh, now instead of having two barely noticeable typos in ONE comment I have two deleted comments and two other comments, one of which is exposing several of my mental health issues best kept under wraps. Blogger fail.

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    2. Well, you are clearly insane. :)
      He's a brilliant writer and has good things to say. I just have to limit my intake. My outrage frightens the monkeys.

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Thanks for reading and taking the time to say hello!