Experts on the Economy

Suddenly, everyone is an expert on the economy. Everybody talks with authority about what went wrong, how to fix it. There are people who make their living acting as if they know about it like Ludlow and Co. I think that is what the show is called. I don't watch that sort of thing. But everyone who has a keyboard is now a pundit, even photographers.

I don't know anything about it, but I thought we all agreed a long time ago that it was bad to have companies so large that their demise could ruin our economic system. Didn't we learn that in home ec or somewhere? My investment plan has been to spend it all, and right now it looks like the better investment. I may be sorry in the long run, but I might not. My mother is a product of the Great Depression, so she has never spent money on anything let alone anything frivolous. She puts all her money in the bank's equivalent of her mattress. She sleeps better at night not worrying and she looks pretty clever now, too.

This is an old, crummy photograph I took in 1976. Like the others, the negative is long gone, so this is a scan from a very bad proof sheet. There is no manipulation here. We did not have video cameras. This was completely accidental. I was photographing my girlfriend lying in front of the TV when this image came on. I believe it was an ad for something. A five hundred dollar bill. I am sorry that the photo did not turn out better. I don't think I ever printed it.

Sex and money have always seemed similar to me. People desire both and the worst will do terrible things to get them. And neither have value other than what we agree upon. How much is a dollar worth? A kiss? A night spent with a stranger?

There was a bit of a recession when I took this photograph, too. I sure hope my mother has enough money for the two of us to live on.