Irrational Exuberance

by Dennis Green

Haven’t heard from George Gadsby since the earthquake of 7.2 near Cabo. But our last exchange about irrational exuberance, as the villainous Allan Greenspan called it, still has me thinking.

Greenspan, of course, contributed to the irrational exuberance of the hedge fund and derivatives managers who had to be bailed out to the tune of $900 billion by the Bush Administration. Their exuberance makes speculators in real estate — that is to say, anyone who buys property — look like pikers.

But let’s assume for the moment that irrational exuberance is, as George puts it, at the very core of our human existence. If so, then we all experience it in one form or another. When I do, in my writing, I’m sure that some of my readers feel that I’ve taken leave of my senses, instead of being my usual incisive self.

In the realm of the spiritual, I’m sure my exuberance reaches irrational heights at times, and probably my skepticism does too. But so be it. I’ve seen the white light, but I also quarrel with theology. I’ve been a Jesus Freak, and a Buddhist, since 1966, but I don’t buy into any of the guff that’s been written about both figures.

What else? Women. Lordy, Lordy! My exuberance regarding the opposite sex has at times reached passionate, irrational, FOOLISH peaks of experience few men know. There’s a wonderful exchange in Spies Like Us: “Stop thinking with your dick!” “Why? It got me through high school.” Well, in my case, it got me through grammar school, junior high, high school, college, grad school, my twenties, four marriages, numerous love affairs, at least one mid-life crisis, and all the way to my retirement and beyond. Thank God!

Even got me off a barstool the other day.

I look on in amazement as my friends and acquaintances are moved to irrational exuberance by passions that don’t move me — the betting pool on basketball or golf, for example. The lottery. Gambling in Reno or Las Vegas or at the nearest Native American casino. Ho-hum!

Property. I see people turn themselves inside out to buy a house, then scrounge and scrape a living together after they pay all their property and parcel taxes, repairs and maintenance, insurance and utilities. When people, or some big corporation says, “I own all this land,” I’m just amused. “This land is my land/This land is your land/from California to…the shores of Tripoli.”

As for money, I don’t lust after it at all, but two kinds of things it can buy: clothing and gadgets. As a kid, I was fascinated by our Erector Set, my Lincoln Logs, the neighbor’s Tinker Toys. Soon it was cars, and I was a hot rodder, customizing every car I owned until my first MG-TD. Today, it’s the iPhone, iMac, iPod and Kindle. I was going to get an iPad, until I saw the line going halfway ‘round the block at the Apple store in Emeryville. Maybe later.

I find the opposite of irrational exuberance in disinterest, which is more like Zen detachment than indifference. And as I near 70, I find myself experiencing a greater sense of disinterest in everything, in life itself. The best cure, perhaps, for irrational exuberance is that finger tapping you on the shoulder, the hand of Mr. Bones.

©2010 Dennis Green