Signs of Recovery

I am no expert. I am just a writer who covers the news and gets to hear a lot of different points of view. And I'm hearing a common theme: Believe it or not, things are getting better.

If you've lost your job, if you're losing your home, if you're awake nights worrying about the future, understand that I'm not minimizing your situation. I'm just as scared as you are. But the fact remains, there's evidence that the economy is starting to breathe on its own.

Let me tell you what I've heard.

1. From the editor of a business publication that covers New York's Hudson Valley -
"Businesses are starting to make some very cautious plans for long term growth. Small businesses are still starving for credit but it seems like nobody's hiding under a blanket waiting for the storm to pass. They're coming out."

2. From a writer in Pennsylvania who's working on a book on the rush to drill for natural gas - "The gas companies disappeared for a few months there. They were rescinding leases, not taking out any news ones. I think the money for those leases were coming from the stock market and there just wasn't any. But in the last six to eight weeks, they're back. They're buying up leases again. It was such a relief when they were gone, but I guess it's a good economic sign that they're able to afford to get back to snapping up drilling rights."

3. From the New York State Association of Realtors - Sales of single homes in New York were up 14% in March compared to February - and prices seems to be creeping back up. Ulster County in the mid-Hudson Valley, had an eye-popping, jaw-dropping increase in homes sales of almost 67% from February to March.

4. Solar manufacturers are opening up facilities - three of them in the Hudson Valley in the past couple of months. There's a new wind energy project underway as well.

5. From a friend who works at a major radio network - "We're told the layoffs are over. They've cut as much as they're going to and now they're going to be trying some new ideas to market what we do across the country."

6. That business journal? It's starting up a new paper to replace a group of community papers that shut down when the Journal Register went bankrupt.

7. Banks are lending. They're darned careful and you'd better have all your ducks in order and have the money to back it up, but they're lending. That may seem unfair, but those stricter standards were the only ones that ever really made sense. It's a reality check.

8. Sonic is opening a new restaurant near me. Yeah, yeah, big deal you say. But this is in a town that recently saw its Friendlys Ice Cream shut down. It's lost Boston Market, Linens 'n Things stands vacant, Ann Taylor packed up and went home and Lazy Boy got off his recliner and hit the road. But Sonic's moving in. Not only that, but there are about half a dozen new gas stations all owned by one obviously very optimistic guy.

This is just one small corner of the globe, but we're not an isolated pocket. If things are getting better here, it's getting better in other places as well.

And what's really encouraging is that this damned uncomfortable time has resulted in some noticeable changes. A local town is organizing a massive cleanup day where over a hundred people have volunteered to go out and pick up the trash. And they're planning to do it again in the fall. A local realtor reports she's got customers who are moving to the country, deciding that if they have to change careers, they want to find work that contributes something to society.

We're not out of the woods, but maybe the trees are thinning. Hang on.

And if you've got any other signposts that indicate we're on the road out, share them here. We all need to hear.

***UPDATE***
A report on http://moneymorning.com speculates that a sharper than expected drop in the GDP can be considered good news as well, though you've got to squint to see it, in my opinion. An economic advisor in Pennsylvania says it's good/bad news - that it means companies are running as lean as they possibly can and any increase in demand at all is going to have a major positive effect. Okay. I'm willing to consider the idea.

But I've also been told some consider all this a bull trap. I wasn't familiar with the term - I thought it was a typo for something else. But a bull trap, I'm told, is a slight improvement which suckers any leftover cash into the market, only to have it rush down the drain with a sudden whoosh. Kinda like the dead cat bounce.

It's all speculation, people. Anyone who says they know for sure is blowing smoke because the one thing you cannot predict is confidence - and that's what this is all based on.

But it is interesting to see the signs and I admit to wondering what would happen if everyone started pointing out the bright spots in the darkness. Might we all pull out of this sooner?

Don't Just Read This

I was finally depressed enough to watch "21 Grams" last night. To get in the right mood, I watched "Synedoche, NY", too.

I have questions. About life.

First, let me say they're both great films. I am a confirmed Charlie Kaufman groupie, but I wouldn't say one is better than the other. They're both insightful, touching films done in an interesting way. And there is a common thread between them. They're examinations of life, what it means, and what connects us all, as well as what keeps us apart.

The message I got from "21 Grams" is that life can turn in an instant, that each choice we make has a million consequences that we can't foresee. Sean Penn's character got a second chance and he made a new life with it. Naomi Watts and Benicio Del Torro were blasted out of their lives by an accident - and until each of them could feel they'd actively been involved and acted in response to it, they were paralyzed. It was disturbing to see just how quickly a person can disintegrate once he or she is swept under the tidal wave of random tragedy. Given a sense of control, that person can just as quickly begin to live again.

Are we living that tenuously? And what does that mean for the people who have lost so much in this recession/depression? Do we really understand the emotional cost of losing your job, your home, your retirement savings?

Then there's "Synedoche, NY". It's a term, I now know, not just a word that sounds like Schenectady. Understanding one part as a way of understanding the whole. And that's what we're shown through Philip Seymour Hoffman's character. By watching him try to understand life by recreating it, we see the universal confusion, the universal disillusionment, the universal disconnect. We watch Hoffman watch actors playing out his life, finally watching him become an actor in his own play, following the direction of an unseen voice.

"Is it about the futility of life?" KB wondered afterwards. I think it is, but it's more. It's about how important and simultaneously meaningless our lives are, a fact that we ignore - perhaps because we can't fathom it.

So we're all just "little people" wandering through our so-brief existences, trying to make meaning of something and looking for non-existent answers? That view should upset me, but it's strangely inspiring - doesn't that mean anything is possible? That we are free to make this experience whatever we choose and when our part in the play is over the spotlight goes out on us but other equally central yet insignificant characters continue the show?

Is there something liberating about knowing we don't really matter, yet we do?
I think there might be, because knowing that requires us to acknowledge that we are no more or less important than the other players in this show...and that each of us is capable of doing anything. There is no stage direction.

So why are we choosing to connect only remotely? We Twitter, we Facebook, we MySpace, we update our friends and family by email. Too many of us literally update the world when we go to work, have a cup of coffee, make dinner. "Tired - headed to bed now," we write. We actually say goodnight to the virtual world.

I sit here, alone in a quiet room, and ponder the ideas raised by movies I've seen, knowing that people I've never met all over the world will read what I write. Why?

Our teenagers text, sext and hook up without making connections. Our children play video games instead of stickball.

I love the virtual community for the understanding it can promote. But I hate that we're using it to replace real communication.

I'm happy to know you read this. I think it's important to wonder about the big issues. But I don't want us to stop here. I want you to sit down with other people and start a conversation. "I read this thing," you can say. "This woman was wondering what life was all about and I thought..." Finish the sentence. There is no right or wrong choice - just your opinion. But what is important is for you to think about what YOU think, then sit down with other human beings and find out what THEY think. Ask kids what they think. Ask old people. Ask someone you love. Or don't talk about this at all. Talk about something else that really interests you, that you wonder about. But talk - and then listen. That's connecting. And that is important.

What You Can Do To Help

I got this email yesterday. It's about an effort by writers to help put pressure on the Chinese government to free human rights activist Liu Xiaobo.

I just came across your blog entry on Liu Xiaobo and Liu Xia. Thank you so much for helping to spread word about his case! PEN is working hard to help free him, and will be awarding him the 2009 PEN/Barbara Goldsmith Freedom to Write Award for his unyielding dedication to free expression (http://www.pen.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/3423/prmID/172). As part of our advocacy campaign on his behalf, we are urging people of conscience to sign a petition calling for his release – www.pen.org/liu. Writers—his colleagues—like Edward Albee, Margaret Atwood, and Salman Rushdie have already added their names. Can you help spread the word and post another blog calling people to action?

Sarah Hoffman

Freedom to Write Associate

PEN American Center


Want to read more about this? Go here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7842315.stm


Want to help?

Go here:

www.pen.org/liu

The Best Image of Corporate America Ever

I can take no credit for this. The first I saw of it was here...a hipster blogger/cartoonist beloved of my hipster daughter.



http://www.oddtodd.com/message875.html

But it's genius because it's so clear. Corporate America isn't structured like a pyramid, nor is it an oval..it's a big, fat, top-heavy broccoli. But when it tries to make cuts, all the cuts are coming off the bottom.

Socialized Autos

I went to the NY Auto Show this week. I haven't been in years, nor has KB. My daughter has never been at all. If you want to know what's wrong with the auto industry, it's a great place to go. No wonder they're begging for government handouts.

KB wanted to see the concept cars - the weird, scifi models that never see the light of day. I always find them sad - they're what engineers would do if they were allowed to make cars that people truly could be excited about. This year, there was no money in the budgets for futuristic vehicles - most companies showed their slightly-better-than-before fuel sippers. Excitement? Zero.

Chevy tried. It had a massive transformer figure standing above its two uninspiring Volt models. If the robot moved, it would have been a show-stopper - but it didn't move while I was there and the cars looked like cheap plastic toys; people yawned and moved on.

The big excitement was next door at Scion. That's where the iQ was on display. It's a Toyota with a new look, but they get it. It's economical, it's cheap, it's great on gas and it looks like nothing else on the road.

Smart Cars got a lot of attention, as did mini-Coopers. There were lines to get close to the electric luxury cars, the Fisker's Karma.

And then there were the tired old white bread cars in different settings. VW had a futuristic stage and everyone else was completely forgettable. My daughter wondered why anyone would ever want to go to an auto show, though she was quite fond of the Scion iQ.

Land Rover and Hummer, the old dinosaurs, were pushing luxury over efficiency. I heard the Land Rover shill informing visitors that the new model has more leather inch for inch than any other vehicle. Dead animals and gas guzzling - there's a winning combination.

There was one truly amazing car in the "no way!" category, and it made the whole show worthwhile. It was the Bertone Bat 11.



It put the other millionaires' sports cars to shame and it was a great story. Apparently the company was about to fold. Because of their finances, for the first time ever, they didn't have a stand at the Geneva Show. But they did have the Bat. And this latest version of a 50 year old concept car so excited investors and the world's top designers that they decided Bertone had better stay open to produce up to 50 of these babies.

Where are the exciting ideas from GM, from Chrysler? Conservatives continue to push the argument that the Obama administration is inappropriately stepping into the car industry - demanding changes in corporate leaders, dictating salaries, calling for new business plans. "He's socializing the industry!" is the alarmists' rallying cry.
I have one question. Didn't they ask for help?

Let's be clearer - didn't they beg for help? Didn't they say they were going under, and said it again after receiving an initial monstrous loan?

I'll make it simple. My money (which God knows I wish I could keep) is keeping them afloat because they can't do their jobs. They haven't ever anticipated the market - they always react to it, and later than their Japanese competitors. So now they want a loan - I don't loan money to a business without guarantees that they're spending it wisely. And if they can't get it together after the first loan, I'm fine with walking in, booting the people at the top and forcing the changes that will turn my money into a sound investment.

That's good business.

What Sacrifice Would You Make For Freedom?

I stumbled across this OpEd in the Washington Post. They titled it "A Voice for My Husband." It stopped me in my tracks.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/04/15/AR2009041502901.html?nav=rss_opinion/columns

I can spout the same old platitudes..."we're so lucky...we take our freedoms for granted...American has become complacent..." Blah blah blah.

This isn't a theoretical discussion. This is about a couple who lives in China and have made the conscious choice to speak out against a repressive regime, fully aware of the consequences it will mean. These are people who live in a country where the government is something to be feared. They have chosen to have no children - it would be too difficult for a child to live without a father.

Liu Xiaobo has been in jail since December, though he's been charged with no crime. His wife has seen him only twice. All the letters they write, all the books she sends, are confiscated. And now his wife, Xia Liu, has written an appeal to President Obama to intervene on her husband's behalf. She believes he is about to be tried as a subversive as the Chinese government strives to silence pro-democracy voices.

Liu Xiaobo is an internationally recognized champion of human rights. He has won an award from Reporters Without Borders for his defense of freedom of the press. He is a well respected teacher and a strong advocate of advancing the cause of democracy and human rights in his country. He is a symbol - and symbols make excellent targets.

These are heroic people. These are people who put many of us to shame, people who risk not just their comfort but their safety for what they believe is right.

I look in the mirror, see the woman who worries about paying the bills, despairs of her country when she hears reactionaries on both sides of the political spectrum scream too loudly to hear each other, and wonder - would I be willing to do that?

I don't know. But we should help those who will.

My Hero: Susan Boyle

Do you need to smile? Do you need a lift? Watch Britain's biggest contribution to making a better world ever. And watch Simon Cowell's face as she nears the end. What a softy. I like being a human right now.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxPZh4AnWyk