Row Away From The Rocks

Hedge your bets. Hope for the best when you strike out against the prevailing tide, but always guard against failure by moving to the middle of the road. Always have a Plan B. Subjugate the truly substantial things you could accomplish to the altar of solvency. Call on God, but...

I have been thinking about money lately. Non stop. There are, of course, two groups that think about money more than they should. Those who need it and those who have too much of it. Those who have just enough to not notice, well... they are very rare birds indeed. I want to be that bird. I know the consequences of financial failure first hand, but I also know the potential benefits of the high road.

I need to finance a restaurant and a magazine; a not insanely expensive, but not particularly cheap restaurant. But it's a place that I plan to put everything I have worked hard to understand about cooking together. It is stuck in my head and I can't get it out. And I have spent the last few years preparing for it. I've been in front of the camera and gotten people talking, something which believe me does not come naturally. I've stuck to my guns and stayed here and championed this place, my home, and I think have had at least some positive impact on our dining scene. And now I need to get back in the kitchen to finish the job. And I don't mean to be arrogant, but the region needs it too. I have spent the last decade, not just thinking about what I want to to cook, but what we should be cooking here, in this place, in a way that suits us here and only here. It's not about me, but us. And I think I've finally got a line on it. I don't know for sure, because we have to build it, cook in it, taste it, spit it out and start again. But I do know we are closer at this moment that we have ever been. And the only thing standing between us and a giant leap to the next level is cash.

And so I think about money. More to the point, I think about the good things that never happen in this world because they go un-financed. Not just the capital conceits like restaurants, but the charitable, ideological, environmental... we seem to have an enormous ineptitude when it comes to knowing where to put our  money. This is particularly shocking when you think about how much time and resources we apply to that very question. But it's true. We routinely spend our money poorly in the grand scheme of things. Sometimes we are too conservative, sometimes too greedy, sometimes just plain stupid. Mostly we are arrogant, especially when it comes to money. So many people who have money feel that it validates them, that somehow they have achieved expertise that is commensurate to their capital.

What I have learned is quite the opposite. I am repeating myself but it merits repeating: money rarely equals taste. Or intelligence. Or financial savvy, even. In my experience, those who have money are most likely in that position because of inheritance, greed, or dumb luck. Generally speaking, the rich are not a particularly impressive lot. Folks like Aubrey McClendon and Donald Trump should provide ample evidence to support my theory. Unfortunately, doing something with long term positive effects is of little interest to someone judging the quality of an investment by how quickly and aggressively it provides returns. So we languish in mediocrity, the rich get richer and buy more marble counter tops, and the rest of us dream of nothing more than an opportunity to really achieve. Change the world. Today. Not in a decade when the simpletons with cash finally figure it out, but now.

I think the fact that we live in a country that has such enormous wealth but still bumbles it's way so clumsily through first-worldism is proof enough that the current crop of resource intensive humans are not up to the task (just to be clear, this post is not a rant against my former employers). It can be too easy to load a chip on your shoulder when things aren't going your way, and I cannot honestly say that a few sour grapes have not influenced my current unsavory mood. But, gun to my head, even with the benefit of distance, I think what I say has validity. I think we are coming to a very important tipping point in western civilization: soon the market and the economy will no longer be two sides of the same coin. Soon, the market will consume the economy and the trend which already favors excess for the few will become the rule.

And the only way to stop it is to opt out. Start putting your coin in the purse of the guy who has no shareholder to answer to: the guy who answers to his client and his community. Become mistrustful of any relationship that does not include a face you recognize and a handshake you feel good about. Put your money into something you want to see in your community, something you know is going to make the world immediately around you a better place, instead of some faceless fund that is accountable to no one, especially you, and provides you little more than a few extra dollars.

You will never spend your money more wisely.