The Year of Magical Thinking

Perhaps giving evidence to time being a flat circle, in the year 2022 I've become enthralled with books again, like a teenage me eagerly heading to the library after school or rushing home after school to eagerly devour another few chapters in Brian Jacques's "Redwall series," now I head to the library as an adult anticipating what new treasures might be in the "New Arrivals" section. (My wish to visit all the baseball stadiums/ colleges in America has evolved into wanting to visit all the top libraries/bookstores in America). I don't feel bad about checking books out at the library because MJ supports publishers/the book industry by buying a book once in a while that she really feels in touch with, and the most recent purchase was "The Year of Magical Thinking," by the late great Joan Didion, in which she describes the year of trauma and recovery after her husband's death on December 30, 2003. She does something to cope with being a widow that I can wholeheartedly relate to: For each day in 2004 she thinks about what she was doing with her husband a year ago that day, in 2003, thus keeping his memory alive and spending that year (of magical thinking) still with him. 

I do the same thing, except I do it for multiple different years, always looking back and checking where I was, what I was doing, retreiving select memories to use as milestones in my life, and recently, I've been doing that after my grandfather passed away. thinking about what I was doing a year ago, 10 years ago, 30 years ago (December was my 30-year anniversary of arriving in America for the first time with my grandpa when I was just four and a half, starting a new life with him, and 30 years later I would be starting a new life without him). The Year of Magical Thinking darts back and forth in town in its narration from the present to a year ago to 30 years ago it might be construed as undisciplined and difficult to follow by the amateur reader, but the way Joan weaves all the themes together shows her talent to make such mundane events in her life seem part of an overall story. It also really gives credence to the "time is a flat circle" theory where things that happened in the past seem somehow to be running parallel to the present time, like they've always been there and just happened to come sequentially earlier in our minds but doesn't necessarily need to be any order, just things that occurred that could be re-arranged in different ways based on how we remember them.

Perhaps the thoughts of grief and death and manipulating time to better comfort ourselves has influenced my choice in movie tonight: Arrival, with Amy Adams, from what I understand very much about those very same concepts.  It is really a funny thing, this idea of time: Is there really an alien species out there that can harness the passing of time and make different events happen in different sequences? If so I'd like to talk to those aliens (as Amy Adams did) as there's a few things I'd like to change about the past as well as some good memories I'd like to revisit and relive, if just ever so briefly. For now, though, I guess I just have to continue living my Year of Magical Thinking. 

Fantasize on, 

Robert Yan 

Pain (疼痛, 통증, 痛み)

 Pain is one of the gifts of life.....without it, we would not be aware of severe dangers to our well-being. It's our bodies' way of telling us what NOT to do. There's a parable I learned as a kid about teaching little children what not to do: the more you tell a kid not to put his hands in the fireplace, the more the kid will want to do it. The best way is to have him put his hands in once, get burnt and feel the pain, then he will not do it ever again. 

That was the long way of saying I am feeling a lot of pain right now with stocks, but at least I will learn from it and know what not to do in the future. They say experience/ time is the best teacher; pain has a strong case too, maybe the math teacher vs. the language teacher. There are many types of pain: physical pain, emotional pain, financial pain, regretting pain (psychological pain), etc.... the different forms impact people to different degrees. Financial pain has always been a big motivator for me not to make the same mistake twice, but as more money comes in, that pain gets dulled to the point of forgetting it, so the big bad stock market inserts some big drops once in a while to give sharp reminders of that pain. 

It's a good thing I can withstand financial gain (don't jinx it!) for now, because I REALLY can't stand financial pain. MJ says that a lot of men have low pain tolerance at the hospital and don't behave "like a man" when it comes to taking it like a man, and I believe it. I would consider myself one of those sissy men. I wince not only every time blood is drawn, but every time the nurse pricks my finger to check iron! It's like crying before the tearjerker movie "Titanic" has even started. I try to comfort myself that it's my body's natural defense system to try to shield itself from further pain, by being more sensitive to pain, and it's a sign of health (like if you had a strong reaction to the Covid vaccine, your body is likely healthy because the anti-bodies came out in force to fight what it thought was the vaccine). Often, though, I find that it's the ANTICIPATION of pain that "hurts" me the most, just knowing that something painful is coming makes me react much more than if the pain had just happened spontaneously without forewarning. Same excuse for covering my ears at a scary warning: I can't stand the anticipation. A nurse/ phlebotomist once joked with a fellow nurse when she was about to stick the needle in my arm at a blood donation: "What did you do to him?" she asked the other nurse. In a perverse way, I kind of would like to be a phlebotomist one day, not because I have a sadistic desire to inflict pain, but because I want to PREVENT pain as much as possible because I've been there. (My hands are too clumsy though to be of good use there). 

Other than voluntarily getting a bit of discomfort (not even pain, really, compared to what some other people have to deal with) every 2 months at a blood drive, I don't deal with pain much at all: maybe the electric shock there from touching a charged-up car or electric switch (another one where anticipation is worse than the actual pain), cutting myself slightly, etc... so I live a life of luxury. Even just thinking about pregnant mothers......the needles, the hunger pains, the nausea, and that all-out sprint to the finish line of pushing out the baby (or the C-section option which also isn't quite a picnic in the park) deserves more recognition. And there's really no "lesson" learned from that sort of pain, except I guess not to have a baby again. It was a voluntary sacrifice to take a huge gamble that having a baby will all be worth it....and for many people, supposedly, it is. Just the anticipation of it all, though, would make me cringe, and instead of 5 minutes or so waiting to give blood and knowing there will be a big needle going into my arm, it's knowing that a whole person will be coming out of my stomach, and the wait is at least 9 months. Kind of a crazy proposition if you think about it, that mothers willingly put themselves throught that sort of pain. Must be a lot of love involved. I also think, despite the pain that I go through each blood donation, I always come back time after time for more voluntary pain, for a benefit that I've never actually seen be used for any good; my blood could be thrown away or used to help a villanous monster who doesn't deserve it; who knows. I guess, though, I think it's worth doing, no matter how painful or irrational it might seem. 

And why am I comparing blood donations to pregnancy anyway? 

Fantasize on, 

Robert Yan 

Military Service (병역, 兵役, ミリタリーサービス)

 I joke to MJ that she is going through her military service now: As a new nurse, she has had to work through some pretty tough assignments, pulling night shifts, getting up at odd times, dealing with difficult patients, staying up on her feet most of the day (or night, depending on when she works), and adjusting to the day-to-day trials and tribulations as a nurse. Meanwhile, most of the world has been working from home during the pandemic, much like I am, with all the amenities available to work of taking breaks anyime I want, not having to go anywhere to get to work (just logging onto my computer is the extent of my commute), and fixed hours every day that I need to work. Often, MJ is so busy that she doesn't have time to eat because she's helping patients and serving people. That doesn't seem too bad if it's an 8-hour shift (still, CA law mandates a lunch break for all employees, recognizing the need for healthy and well-fed employees) but often he shifts are 12-13 hours, and that's not counting the commute back and forth as well as having to arrive early to prepare and stay late in case of emergencies! It really seems like a battleground out there, except unless military service in Korea for males (usually about 18 months), MJ's time horizon goes much longer: this is what her job will be like for the foreseeable future! 

I often wonder what my life would have been like if I had to do mandatory military service like South Korean men have to do, and how lucky I was not to do it. I can imagine that the military is a very disciplined organization full of salutes, respecting authority, waking up early (crack of dawn), and plenty of physical training like climbing ropes, crawling under fences, traversing through obstacle courses, etc. Considering I was never able to climb the rope during gym or do more than one pull-up ever (I still dont' think I can, to this day) so the 18 months would likely have been miserable. But that's the point: discipline is not a fun activity, but it should teach one to adapt a disciplined lifestyle, to build up a routine, to be physically tough and mentally tough. I think I lack some of those skills, and lots of Americans do as well. After turning 18 and graduating high school, my adult life began with one of the more relaxed places an adult can be: college, where no one's policing your whereabouts, you can sleep in until any time you want, parties around campus can happen any time between Wednesday-Sunday night, you don't have to go to class if you don't want to, you're surrounded with thousands of people your age who are doing the exact same thing of "discovering themselves" and setting up their own free time. It's truly a liberating experience that gives a refreshing sense of freedom from parents, worries, and responsibilities, but is it really good for young adults to be that free that quickly? Given that I was pretty big into watching movies, playing poker, and hanging out at the basketball court during most of college, I'd say I didn't get hardened and ready for the big bad world out there, and it showed when I went directly to law school.....I wasn't ready for the competition, the rigors of working at a law firm, etc. I now realize why many employers like seeing some military experience from job candidates: it's not necessarily that they have the technical abilities associated with the military, it's just that they went through the military school/training process and survived, that they were in a rigorous system and didn't just slack off through college showing up only for the final exams. Just like I criticize my parents' parenting style sometimes for being too soft and making my sister and I weak and ripe for spoilage, I think putting yourself in a soft environment (aka, American universities) weakens the individual, makes them complacent and feel like they've got everything figured out, road ahead is all clear. It's usually not. 

Luckily in my lifetime, the US has never done a draft or conscription for foreign wars, relying on the armed forces they already have (who knows if this will continue given that Russia is on the brink of invading Ukraine as we speak and the China-Taiwan relations always have the US on edge, with similar situations in a bunch of other places around the world), so I have the luxury of just seeing battlefields from afar (especially the US forces in Bagram, Afghanistan over the summer) knowing there's no way I would ever need to take arms or join the forces.  What if I had gone through military training though? I feel like my world view would have changed, I would much more likely be sure to get enough no later than 8AM every single day no matter the circumstance (I woke up at 10:30AM on a Super Bowl Sunday this morning, it felt great but it softened me up), my world view about wars would change (instead of just thinking, Oh, "US invaded Iraq?" or "US is pulling out of Afghanistan?" Hmm, I would grasp how big of a move that is for the soldiers having to be deployed, or in some cases, able to go home to their families. I would appreciate my life enjoying the comforts of home much more, and always look back at the days of military service for some inspiration to work harder/ instill more discipline/ tough it out through severe hardships. 

Then again, MJ says sometimes Korean men get a little too arrogant after having done military service, like they accomplished something great and then look down on Korean women who don't have to do military service. Also there's leaders who take the job too seriously or are "nutjobs" who go on power trips, or "hazing sessions" reminiscent of joining a fraternity. Last year BTS (the boy band) made the news for having to do military service even though they're international singers and have a lot better things they could be doing, and Psy, the Gangnam Style singer, had to do 2 stints of military service!!

追逐, 追跡, 추격 (The Chase)

 Along with my daily appointment-level viewing of Jeopardy in the last year-plus with MJ, I've snuck off and indulged in a different show on my own called the Chase, a British-based show that was spun off to different countries like Australia, Germany, and.....the U.S. The premise is that ordinary people answer trivia questions to try to win the prize money, but a trivia expert (think James Holzhauer and Ken Jennings-level experts) try to chase the contestants down by answering more questions. It's a fun concept and apparently gets pretty good ratings (nationally syndicated) and the prize money is substantial....if the contestants are good enough to outrun the chaser. I like the US version because it brings back old favorites of the Jeopardy world like James, Ken, and Brad Rutter (as well as a bunch of contestsants who were multiple-day champions on Jeopardy), but the British and Australian versions introduces me to a new world of facts from other countries (namely cricket) but a whole host of other interesting characters with names like "Tiger Mum," "Governess," "Supernerd," and "Goliath." It squeezes less questions into a longer time frame than Jeopardy, but it still gives enough information to be exciting and worthy of the title "The Chase." 

Beyond the trivia, though, I think The Chase capitalizes on a fundamental concept that applies to competitive human beings like me: the thrill of the chase. I have always been motivated by goals and the pot at the end of the rainbow, and that elusive dream is what spurs me on, gives me a purpose every morning to wake up and chase that good. It's been that way for me ever since high school: try to be a chess state champion (didn't quite make it), try to get into an Ivy League school (applied to Stanford, Harvard, etc... didn't get in), try to get the best LSAT score I could and go to the best law school I could, find a job, then after graduation, learning Japanese, becoming a dodgeball champion (didn't really happen), and finally, this latest long-term goal of being the best trivia champion I can be. It's like a quote from the Wire (set in Baltimore, one of the best TV shows ever): Life is what happens when you're waiting for days that never come. Often it's the case that we don't achieve our ultimate dream or the pot full of gold, but it's the journey that is valuable and that I can look back to after my long journey and realize, wow that was a pretty thrilling journey, and it was worth it to chase after my goal. I imagine that if and when I do finally achieve my goal (for example, mastering Korean and Japanese) I will be satisfied but oddly not as excited as when I still had that goal I was shooting for, and probably a little sad that I've lost that desire and drive. I'd have to get another goal and engage in another, different Chase. 

Oh yea, and the same concept applies to a parallel goal: making as much money as I can. There's really no limit to how much money one can make, is there? I guess there's an objective standard for most people of "FIRE" (Financial independence, retire early), but becoming rich is really different for everybody, and greedy people like myself will always be on the go to make more money, to get more stuff, so the journey never ends, and the thrill of the chase is always there. It is exciting, though, to get to different levels of financial goals, like 1.) paying off student debt, 2.) having enough to invest in stocks, 3.) owning my own car free and clear, 4.) putting down enough money for a down payment on a house. Oh, and being able to afford vacation every year and nice amenities for myself once in awhile. 

Fantasie on, 

Robert Yan 

Mortgage (抵押, モーゲージ, 저당)

 Happy Chinese New Year! The year of the tiger is upon us, and it was fitting for me to start the year by visiting my friend in Colorado with multiple cats. I've seen his cats grow from young kittens in 2012 to family fixtures to welcoming in a new human being into the world and living with him in 2022, and now the kittens are a little long in the tooth but still spry, welcoming me by jumping on me and trying to get my attention. Maybe they recognized me from so many trips visiting them over the years? 

Ski trip in Colorado broke me out of my months-long funk of just working at home and not going anywhere (also necessitated by the Covid Omicron variant breakout making it risky to get anywhere). It's one thing to go to a new environment and breath different air, sleep in different bed, do different activities other than stare at a computer screen for at least 8-9 hours a day and intermittently typing/clicking, but also meeting with other live human beings and getting to know them, making jokes, engaging in banter, all things that I do with MJ but we're both probably a little tired of ONLY talking to each other. A great weekend can change my perspective on life, alter my lifestyle, provide great memories and great pictures, and solidify friendships that have been tested due to the pandemic and long periods of not seeing each other....They say that familiarity breeds contempt, but lack of familiarity with friends breeds neglect and growing farther apart. 

Another benefit of talking it over with friends: bouncing some investment ideas off each other, especially about the homeowning process, which I am very new to. I'm ashamed I didn't think of it before, but a dinner conversation sparked discussion of paying a little extra towards principal, and if I do that enough times over the course of the loan and using big enough payments, that it could drastically shorten the lifetime of the loan/ lower the total amount of money that is paid for the life of the loan. I have thus far been sticking to the agreed-upon payment terms in the 15-year loan like a chump, not deviating from that set payment and not thinking outside the (mortgage) box, especially since all extra payments will be free from encumberances of property taxes, escrow, and interest payments. Those are all covered in the fixed monthly fee I pay; everything over and above that I pay above that goes directly to the principle of the loan, which is the sweet spot, like lean meat covered by all that grease and fatty outer layers. I am lucky in that I have a nice surplus of money to work with every month (as opposed to some homeowners who have trouble scraping up enough cash to get it together) so that money's just sitting there waiting to be used (and in fact would decrease in value if I just let it sit there). 

Then again, there's a reason I got a mortgage in the first place: low interest rates. With the Federal Reserve announcing plans to raise rate up to 6 times just in 2022, it appears I locked in my mortgage interest rate at around the very low: less than 2.5% (also my credit score helped, another good reason to build up good credit by making all credit card and other payments on time all the time). That 2.5% means if I can put my money towards something that yields 2.5% or better, I should go with that investment instead of pay extra on my mortgage, since earning 2.5% return is about the save as avoiding the 2.5% interest. What, may you ask, yields, 2.5% or more? Well, dividend aristocrats on the stock market, of course. The safest investment out there is US treasury bond yields, which right now are at about 1.95%, not as high as the mortgage rate, but you get that for sure, 100% (unless the U.S. fails, or the world completely fails, in which case there are bigger problems we all face than not getting that 1.95% interest). Shares of individual companies on the stock market are much riskier and can obviously go down, making your initial investment shrink instead of return any money at all, but that's the inherent risk in stocks, and part of that risk is the stock price going significantly higher, which goes ON TOP of getting that dividend payout. Usually technology companies and growth companies don't have a high yield or any (GOOG, Amzn, and Tsla have no dividend, by AAPL, the best company in the world according to many, has a small dividend to give further reason to own the almost 3 trillion-dollar market cap company on top of all the great assets it possesses). But the companies with yields higher than 2.5% are most staple companies, without much growth (since they're paying out money to shareholders instead of investing those in future growth) like ABBV, one of my favorite pharmaceutical companies with headquarters near hometown of Chicago, IL. Every quarter (of a year) like clockwork, ABBV deposits money in my Etrade/Robinhood accounts just for owning the stock, and I of course reinvest that dividend money to benefit from the concept of compound interest, letting interest accrue on the interest and so on and so forth. It's a pretty nice feeling, one I add on to by owning other pharmaceutical companies (tend to have higher dividend payouts) like Pfe and Amgn. Then there's companies like Costco, which sometimes gives out SPECIAL dividends, a lump-sum payment to shareholders, a nice bonus under the Costco Christmas tree just for owning the stock. 

So yes, I do get more excited and wordy when I talk about money, but also there are other ways to spend extra money than to put it towards the principal on the loan payment......but the worst thing in my position is to let that extra money burn a hole in my pocket and just sit there (not under the physical mattress but the proverbial mattress of my checking account, which gives zero extra value).