Buy Low, Sell High

The stingy patron finished his meal, paid his bill, and got up to leave. The server who thought all had gone quite well glanced at the table and surprised himself with his own impetuous boldness asking, “But Sir, no tip?” The scrooge-like diner, with all the empathy of Queen Antoinette, retorted, “Here’s a tip for you: Buy low, sell high.”

The scene is complete fiction, but I have no doubt it happens. Daily life can be loaded with exchanges revealing hope or callousness, appeals for generosity or sarcasm. There are two allusions to “investing” in the vignette. One is obvious, the other subtle. The investment “tip”, is the obvious generality that is true but often hard to do in the market where we never know. The hidden lesson on investment is how the ungrateful one seems to show no interest in investing in human kindness. He seems not to take stock in manners. Miss Manners would remind us good manners grease the wheels of society.

I am not sure where we are as a society about showing civility. To conjecture, I would have first to look more deeply at my own civility. I have confessed before I am rudest, verbally, out loud, when I am driving and not pleased with how people near me are driving. I have tried several “go-to” phrases of neutrality to keep myself calmer, like the song of the Christmas Angels: “Peace on earth, goodwill toward men.” It takes saying it three times to slow my pulse. Or, I will say, dispassionately, “Hmmm, that was such an interesting driving maneuver.” Once I even made up a jingle…I can’t change how others drive / if I could, I’d surely strive / But since I can’t, while I’m alive / I’ll stick to minding how I drive. I see improvement in myself only in bits and pieces.

I hope I am not trivializing the topic. I dug up this piece from an actual Miss Manners post, and she convincingly conveys there are deep elements to manners:

The underlying purpose of manners is to enable people to get along with one another, which includes not only being nice but using civil means to settle differences and conflicts. Yet every activity -- not just meals and weddings, but work of various kinds, shopping, driving, even just walking down the street -- has its specific rules, derived from both practicality and custom. Courtesy requires making allowances for well-intentioned mistakes. You ignore them unless they are being committed by your own children. Sneering at ignorance is not only rude but dangerous since everybody has to count on tolerance at some time.

Let’s branch out from here. The whole of our lives and every kind of action, attitude, and thought is something that deserves our care. The days we have to live on this earth, the times within each day, and the energy we have to spend within them is given to us by God. You could say God is invested in us, and we are managers of what belongs to God. This makes us stewards of divine assets, the gifts we possess, and the circumstantial and material realities we are authorized to invest. We can just bury and sit on the gifts we have been given, and in the end, yield back just the bare element of our existence. We can cautiously invest ourselves and the time we are given. We can also choose aggressively to invest, at a higher risk, of course. Sitting on what we have to invest yields nothing, except our self-congratulations that we have taken no risks. Moderate-risk investments can yield growth. Determining our own tolerance for the fear and vulnerability that comes with risk, we might yield much more. I can’t print it here, but you should look up Mary Oliver’s “The Fourth Sign of the Zodiac. (Part 3) Let me take a risk and give you just a few lines to get started:

I know, you never intended to be in this world. / But you’re in it all the same. / So why not get started immediately.

Finding this Oliver piece and reading on would not disappoint. She is a poet who urges us to a life well-lived and speaks of how to maximize our aliveness. Did you know in a wildly profound way, that is what Jesus urges us to do? The parable we will hear this Sunday is an example, and a barbed one, of the stress Jesus puts on our need to invest what our Creator has given us by giving us our lives:

Jesus said, “It is as if a man, going on a journey, summoned his slaves and entrusted his property to them; to one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability. Then he went away. The one who had received the five talents went off at once and traded with them, and made five more talents. In the same way, the one who had the two talents made two more talents. But the one who had received the one talent went off and dug a hole in the ground and hid his master’s money. After a long time, the master of those slaves came and settled accounts with them. Then the one who had received the five talents came forward, bringing five more talents, saying, ‘Master, you handed over to me five talents; see, I have made five more talents.’ His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and trustworthy slave; you have been trustworthy in a few things, I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your master.’ And the one with the two talents also came forward, saying, ‘Master, you handed over to me two talents; see, I have made two more talents.’ His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and trustworthy slave; you have been trustworthy in a few things, I will put you in charge of many things; enter into the joy of your master.’ Then the one who had received the one talent also came forward, saying, ‘Master, I knew that you were a harsh man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you did not scatter seed; so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here you have what is yours.’ But his master replied, ‘You wicked and lazy slave! You knew, did you, that I reap where I did not sow, and gather where I did not scatter? Then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers, and on my return, I would have received what was my own with interest. So take the talent from him, and give it to the one with the ten talents. For to all those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away. As for this worthless slave, throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” —Matthew 25:14-3

I have never liked those parabolic allusions to the place of outer darkness. Weeping and gnashing of teeth sound just horrible. Not sure what to do with it.  Suffice it to say, Jesus wants us motivated to invest. His is no glib and forgone investment tip, ‘buy low, sell high.” He is counting on us to manage what we have been given for the glory of God, and for what is true fulfillment and enjoyment. We can hold safety as the highest value in our personal constitutions, but we will be low on joy. We can take all we are and, figuratively speaking, find an old coffee can to put it in, and we can bury it in a part of the yard that no one will ever think of to search.  You will have what you have at the end of it all. Here’s a tip: Jesus has more for us than that to experience. Invest yourself in his ways of love, kindness, generosity, self-giving. The yield is way up there.