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At a recent retirement conference (#Planadviser), one of the keynote speakers was Dave Barry (@rayadverb).?Anyone 50 or older should know exactly who I’m talking about.?If you don’t, then shame on you!?He wrote a nationally syndicated humor column that was one of the first things I read in the newspaper… you know… that paper thing we used to have to get our news!

In his humorous way, Dave called attention to many odd things in life, business, sports, religion, and pretty much any taboo topic out there.?He’d write about topics like redundant wording in memos (see title to this article above), useless business meetings, bad drivers, pets, growing old, etc. ?In addition to his column, he also wrote a lot of books.?One such book was “Dave Barry’s Money Secrets.”?Dave proclaimed to not understand money, but that didn’t stop him from writing about it.

His foolproof way to make money in the stock market was to spend all your money making a time machine.?If that didn't work, he also liked to take lessons from squirrels and how they sock things away.?And when it came to analyzing an investment, he asked the reader for an honest answer as to what was the most important factor: Amount of Return??Degree of Risk? Or The name of the Jockey?

Listening to Dave was like being transported to a younger self and I found myself feeling nostalgic.?We’ve had many great decades, but for me the 80’s trumps them all.?Great music, movies, high school friends, and hardly a care in the world!

Then later that night, relaxing in my bed with my head on the pillow and my eyes shut, but my brain working at full speed, my mind turned to another topic of nostalgia… the good days of the stock market.?During this painful year of 2022 where our accounts are down and we’re feeling the pain, I thought back on the many downturns I’ve experienced in my investing life.?My first foray into investing was 30 years ago, and we’ve had a lot of downturns since then.?Some were small, and some were quite shocking.

When I think of nostalgia and the market, I think of the mid 90’s coming out of a tough 1994.?I think of 2003-2005 after an ugly dot com sell off.?I think of the long period of time after the financial crisis when the market just kept climbing.?I think of the surprise upswing after a furious Covid crash.

Over the years, the downturns have been pretty similar in size and magnitude and length, but the pain has become easier to deal with since I’ve been through it and I know what lies ahead.

What do all bear markets have in common??After the drop and hurt and pain, the market always finds its way to new all-time highs. ?So now I find myself looking forward to the future when I’ll look back on these days and see this current climate as just another dip on the long-term squiggly line upward.