Multi-tasking is for fools...

I have been trying to hold too much, and on the way with everything I try to pick up another thing to bring along and then drop half of what I was carrying and begin to start all over - piling it on, the first adaptation to stress, just pile more of it on. In the 82nd Airborne we were accustomed to juggling lots of priorities, and the only important thing about juggling - was knowing which of the balls were made of glass and which could bounce harmlessly. Nice thing about the procrastination pile, that is all stuff I don't want to do anything with right now... later when I have more time, no glass balls there.

Once a much younger and forward looking fellow (ME?) I stopped every Friday to work on my charts and accounts to figure out what my Networth was, and since I had been keeping paper Cash notebooks since 1969 I could tell you at any point what my dollar value was. Just reaching up on the bookshelves and pulling one down. Oct 1973 (year of the Yom Kippur War) I owed $9595.19 on my trailer, $2803.20 on my Buick, and $70 on my color television, I had $1,191.64 in savings and Savings Bonds. Every month after that the debt went down and the savings went up. Okay, that is a simplification, but I knew where I was and where I was going and could focus. On Fridays I started watching Wall Street Week with Louis Rukeyser as my host and guide into the world of investment. That was about the time I started my IRAs, for tax relief and future retirement, mainly the tax relief - until Congress started messing with it, reduction of my income by whatever my wife and I could put away (up to two grand apiece) was wonderful. My advice to the young, start early, add often and use dollar cost averaging and broad market. I will mention that I don't do that stuff now. I have figured out that I can't ever retire completely, that having some money means that the government automatically wants parts of it, that piece of the pie that they are sure someone somewhere needs more than my wife and I.

One of the things I dropped was that careful accounting of my networth, not really worth the time now. I am running out of time, falling apart physically and likely mentally. I went to the doctor and had my examination and got his best guidance and a new prescription - four days later, after the blood tests (that I haven't seen) came back his office calls and leaves a message that I should call them, I don't. I will stop and talk to the doctor, next Monday on my way to work, for it is easier to dream of chasing long legged redheads, and just smile about how much nicely my motorcycle slides through the traffic and our Sunny days, my son is going to be home that evening... Best do one good thing at a time, multi-tasking means I might miss that smile that will go into my tomorrow, and that would be a shame.