Just drove in from Minneapolis and another Woolly meeting.  Road spray coated the windshield as snow spit out from a darkened, starless sky.

We met and discussed the financial situation around supper.  Almost uniform pessissism and gloom.  It felt weird to me to have this kind of conversation in Charlie Haislet’s top floor, two level condominium with its rooftop garden, first floor balcony and its grand view of downtown.   We, as a group, while not uniform in our resources are uniform in that none of us face starvation, homelessness or even severe disruption.  Have some of us lost thousands, even hundreds of thousands of paper dollars?  Yes.  Does that make us poor?  No.

The worst that could happen is that some of us might have to downsize our homes, live more modestly.  Does that mean a diminished quality of life?  No.

After supper we discussed the next four years and our assessment of where our country would be at the end of Obama’s first administration.  There was a surprising (to me) note of optimism that dominated.  Some of this seemed to be a hope that Obama as an African-American changes the playing field by his presence on it.  Some of it seem to be a hope that we will work our way through the changes in the fiscal situation because we must.  Charlie H worries that an Obama administration will take their eye off the security ball and we will have a nation less safe.  He also worries that throwing government money at the problem is nonsense.  I did not follow that part of what he said.

Frank thought a lot of unprintable things.