Thank you Facebook.
That is not something I say very often. I love that I can follow along with the lives of my friends, but otherwise, I am not a big fan of the social media platform.
Nonetheless, I am thankful for a meme. Yes, those sometimes annoying photos with a caption sprawled across them, which get shared a lot. The inspirational ones are fine, but I can’t stand the ones with an image of a politician and some quote that may or may not have actually been uttered.
This image was about hurricanes and reminded me of how differently people respond to adversity. The image was prompted by tropical storm Erika, which on that date was trying to strengthen to hurricane strength. The weather channel had the center line of its “cone of uncertainty” pointed at my house.
This particular meme came to my attention near the end of August as the market was bouncing around substantially. At the same time, I saw several articles in which adviser types patted themselves on the back for warning clients a correction would come. This bugged me a bit.
Corrections simply aren’t unusual. The S&P 500 has pulled back at least 10 percent in 20 of the 36 calendar years from 1980-2015. Predicting “a correction is coming” is hardly a stroke of genius. Just as Floridians should expect to deal with storms, long term investors should expect to have to deal with corrections and bear markets as a standard operating procedure.
The meme was titled “Hurricane To-Do List” and listed items under two headings. The first was for what the world would have on the list. That list included “watch the weather channel, buy batteries, pack evacuation kit, buy water, watch more weather channel and speculate with neighbors about hurricane”.
The second heading was for what Floridians have on their list. “Buy vodka, complain, plan hurricane party, speculate if work will be cancelled on Monday, buy more vodka and speculate with neighbors about hurricane party”.
And so it is when you have been through something firsthand. The theoretical becomes reality. The intangible becomes tangible, and scary things aren’t quite as scary.
The image made me smile even though I know hurricanes are no laughing matter. In 2004, my house suffered two direct hits three weeks apart. It took over a year before our house was fully repaired, and the neighborhood was free of blue tarps on roofs. Due to the water damage and mold, my then 6-year-old son couldn’t sleep or hang out in his room for 4 months.