Anderson, South Carolina
On a journey to the United Kingdom in the last days of the twentieth century, I was asked to carry out an economic mission by a number of friends and acquaintances - find and acquire Beanie Babies for import. At the time, collecting Beanie Babies was a national, perhaps an international rage. I recall being astounded at the amount of time and money people invested in these small toys. One of these was a royal blue elephant named “Peanut” and it was fetching as much as $6,500 on Internet auction sites. My friends were obsessed with filling their houses with these critters. Many of them spent so much money on these small plush toys as to jeopardize their financial security. Several web sites indicate the inventor of Beanie Babies is now worth about $6 billion because of this rage. The company making these toys is privately owned and does not even list a phone number. Alas, the market for these has softened a bit, but is still stunning. “Peanut” can be had for ‘only’ $1,500 on E-Bay, not bad for something made in Asia and worth far less than $5 when produced. Smelling a major downdraft in the toy market, a lot of sellers are now offering trash bags full of these animals for a mere $999 or best offer.
Another amazing rage that nearly destroyed the economies of many nations was tulip mania in the early 17th century. At the peak of a national obsession with tulips, the Dutch were trading bulbs with an astounding frenzy. Single bulbs changed hands as often as ten times a day. A single rare Violetten Admirael van Enkhuizen bulb that was about to split in two, sold for 5,200 guilders, an all-time record. This is approximately equivalent to two years’ annual income for a wealthy merchant, perhaps a million dollars. One man traded his farmstead for three bulbs. Finally, someone said out loud, “It’s just a bulb, stupid!” The speculative market collapsed in the winter of 1637 and the bulbs lost 99% of their value in a matter of weeks. Today those bulbs can be had for pennies. The greater fool woke up and decided to stay away from the markets.
Beanie Babies never fetched two years income for a wealthy merchant but they did make the inventor of them a multi-billionaire. Three hundred years later our collective sense of fiscal responsibility seems little improved. It certainly makes one wonder just exactly it is that people are doing to find a sense of self-importance. After all, plush toys and tulip bulbs are not mission-critical to the success of our lives. People desperately want to have something you and I don’t have. Owning something rare offers a glimmer of possibility that we might find the even rarer sense of self worth and esteem that does not come from the ‘stuff’ we own. How often have we been admonished by advertisers to be the first on your street to own something?
The United States economy is staggering under the weight of imploding industries, most notably financial and automotive. For similar reasons, people desperate to have something you and I don’t have, are willing to pay great premiums to own cars that are considered limited editions or exclusive. Many of these so-called luxury cars are inconceivably expensive and yet notoriously unreliable. A review of satisfaction surveys confirms this to be well-founded in fact. Many $85,000 sedans don’t have nearly the dependability of my fifteen year old Toyota. Even as the market for average cars has collapsed, the market for high-end cars continues to grow, despite powerful evidence used Toyotas might be a better bet.
Recently I acquired one of those iconic European sedans that are emblematic of those who have achieved a level in life on par with the tulip traders of the 17th century. This car is considered an icon for those who have arrived in life. It was offered to me at what then seemed a truly extraordinary value, an irresistible buy, but ten times on a single day in 1637, the Violetten Admirael tulip bulb seemed like the deal of a lifetime. The only places I have arrived at in this car are several very expensive repair shops. On Monday I journeyed to yet another shop to determine if it would actually be best to cut my financial losses and scrap the car!! Here on Friday, I feel a bit like I am waiting for a biopsy result, I still have not heard from the shop. A new copy of this car sells for $83,600 and it might be in my best financial interest to write it off! Did I unwittingly collect a blue elephant that is losing its stuffing?
In the last century, a complex mythology arose around the sinking of the Titanic. One of the most sobering stories derives from reports of the orchestra playing for hours after the deadly breech in the hull occurred. Belief in the invincibility of the ship was to prove fatal to 1,517 passengers and crew. Titanic's eight-member band, led by Wallace Hartley, assembled in the first-class lounge in an effort to keep passengers calm and upbeat. Later the band moved to the boat deck. The band continued playing, even when it became apparent the ship was going to sink, and all its members perished. A quip often made these days to underscore the uselessness and futility of an activity is simply to state “that is like arranging deck chairs on the Titanic.” Are many of the activities in which we invest much of our time and energy and money just as useless? Does it make sense for someone to suffer through a hideous three-hour commute to a stressful high paying city job in order to afford the very car he makes that commute in?
A visiting priest told us of the eccentric woman who lived across the street from his childhood home. Her husband was the local fire chief and her eccentricity induced her to regularly set small fires in the house, drawing the immediate attention of her husband and the ire of the neighbors. On one occasion the priest was sent over to retrieve an elderly tenant living in a third floor apartment after one of these fires got out of hand. Believing the old woman to be on his heels, he turned to check on her. She was not to be seen. He went back to find her collecting trinkets picked up during her life of travel. The house was burning down and she was willing to risk life and limb to collect things that would matter not if she was prematurely cremated. My priest survived to tell about it. Are we busy in our lives collecting trinkets that simply don’t matter in the least, be it tulip bulbs, iconic cars, designer clothes, granite countertops?
The thirteenth chapter of the gospel of Mark is known as “the little apocalypse.” It contains Jesus’ words suggesting business as usual was about to come to a screeching halt, even faster than Lehman Brothers stopped horse trading. The Israelites had gotten used to the fancy temples and municipal structures in Jerusalem. Several of Jesus’ disciples were carrying on about how grand the local digs were. Jesus suggested the place was going to be so completely shattered as to not leave two stones on top of each other. Four decades later, the Romans carried out their legendary sacking of Jerusalem in 70 AD. To this day we are not even sure what Herod’s temple looked like. The Israelites and Romans forgot over time and never wrote down any of the details.
Writings of Ecclesiasticus found in ancient Eastern manuscripts warned that even the memory of entire civilizations would be completely lost. Whole cities, nations, dynasties, family trees would be as if they never existed. The book of Ecclesiastes found in Western bibles says in sober fashion much the same thing. “For of the wise man, even as of the fool, there is no remembrance for ever; seeing that in the days to come all will have been long forgotten. And how doth the wise man die, even as the fool!”
Will it ever matter at all what breed of horse I rode, what kind of tulip bulbs I had in my yard, what kind of car I picked up girls in? “For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?”
“Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon the earth, where moth and rust consume, and where thieves break through and steal: but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth consume, and where thieves do not break through nor steal: for where thy treasure is, there will thy heart be also.”
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