As the stock indicators on his computer screen filled with red, John Anderson heaved a heavy sigh and gazed out over the woods outside his office window. At the bird feeder were three or four doves, a few chickadees, and a cardinal alarmingly bright against the snowy backdrop.
The birds outside had plenty of seed and were not concerned that Treasury Secretary Yellen had been, despite her training by Nobel winners James Tobin and Joseph Stiglitz, spectacularly wrong in saying in 2021 that inflation would be a transitory consequence of supply chain issues related to covid lockdowns. In the cold light of 2022, John feared that the inflation might be a consequence of central banks around the world printing money, which then chased relatively more fixed amounts of goods and services, resulting in inflation as some Monetarists used to argue. John hoped that was wrong.
What should be done? In many cases, for an investor with a long time-horizon, the best answer was to do nothing and just ride out the downturn. With a shopping list of potential purchases once the stock markets plunged to a certain point, he was watching and waiting and staring at what CNBC and The Wall Street Journal so often called “The Wall of Worry.”
After fetching a fresh mug of black coffee, his mind wandered back to another place and another time — a time when he didn’t know or care about global markets or sovereign bonds or some financial theory. Back then, he had been a soldier and served at various locations including the Sandbox and the Horn of Africa. Such places were described by the military as “armpits of the world” but thankfully not all duty was that dismal. One memorable stretch of time was in Europe, stationed at NATO-linked bases in Italy and Germany.
They were in the field a good percentage of the time, of course, at Grafenwohr and other training sites, enjoying the frozen mud and endless military exercises of a Cold War everybody wanted to remain cold. George Kennan’s advocacy of containment of communism was at the heart of much of the policy of opposing Soviet expansion, and media outlets even in 2022 constantly discussed Russia and Ukraine even as China loomed as a geopolitical force.
But young soldiers are not global strategists. They follow orders, and do not make them. Soldiers were interested in seeing the sights of Europe, sampling the local beer, and appreciating the many pretty girls.
William O. Darby was the father of the Army Rangers, and his name was on several bases, including one in Furth, the little town where Henry Kissinger was born. Furth was near Nurnberg (Nuremberg in English) where the famous war crimes trials were held. In those days, American soldiers serving in NATO typically flew from McGuire in New Jersey, stopped at Gander in Newfoundland or Halifax in Nova Scotia, and depending on weather and other matters often paused for fuel at Shannon in Ireland. Then they headed to Rhein-Main Air Base in Frankfurt, where the sign read “Gateway to Europe.”
Given the efficient train system in Europe, a soldier stationed in Germany would naturally begin pondering travel options if he could nail down a 3-day pass. Long before he ever had a passport, John visited 25 foreign lands using just military ID. The Army had recreational hotels back then where a person on active duty could stay for a dollar a night. One of them was near the Champs-Elysees, and others were at Garmisch-Partenkirchen and Chiemsee and Berchtesgaden. The latter was near Hitler’s alpine retreat which had been bombed by the Brits and Americans, leaving only his guest house above, the Eagle’s Nest (Kehlsteinhaus), for modern tourists to visit.
John and several friends decided, as soon as the opportunity presented itself, to take the obvious step of heading for Paris. For a kid raised on a farm, Paris seemed to represent the apex of sophistication, with the Louvre, the Musee d’Orsay, and also the risque night spots “The City of Light” was known for.
Even in the World War II era, Pigalle was known for decadent entertainment, night clubs, strip shows, topless dancers, bakeries, and robbers who would gladly relieve a drunken fellow of his wallet. The Moulin Rouge had been depicted by Toulouse-Lautrec; Picasso and other notables had resided in the area.
Had they been driving, John would have stopped to visit Verdun, where the longest battle of World War I unfolded. For any person with faith in the rationality of political decisions, Verdun came as a shock. There, at the Douaumont Ossuary, the co-mingled bones of over 100,000 soldiers were preserved. The sobering realism of Verdun would be deferred for a later trip.
After the group arrived in Paris, they spent a busy day taking in the usual sights, and even bought tickets for a cruise on the Seine with Bateaux Mouches. They caught a show at Le Crazy Horse, and admired the lithe topless dancers who combined aerobic fitness with smoldering sensuality. At the end of an evening of bar-hopping, the other guys were intent on further carousing, but John had another destination in mind for himself. He had read in guidebooks that Paris and Copenhagen and Barcelona had live sex shows on stages and he had a laser-like determination to increase his life-experience by watching one. Paris was at the top of his list, so Copenhagen would have to wait.
John found a likely small theater, checked the show times, and was able to enter the little theater not long before the show began. The seats were arranged in a semi-circle around a small oval stage which, as he began to notice, had the capability to rotate. On the stage were several long divans. John took a seat on the far right, with only a wall on that side, and room for his long legs. With just a slight shift of his body to the left, he had a close and unobstructed view of the stage.
As the lights dimmed, a slender blonde girl entered the stage, clad in a tight dress and spike heels. Music began and she began a skillful striptease not unlike many others John had enjoyed. Looking to his left, the seating area for perhaps 100 customers began to fill. He expected to see single males, and they were certainly present in the audience, but there were a surprising number of male-female couples there as well.
The blonde girl slowly removed her bra, and began teasing her nipples. From his seat, the girl on the stage was only about 6 feet away and she moved around the stage to allow herself to be seen by all of the customers. Her nipples hardened as she touched the fabric of her thong. Her breathing was more audible as she touched the front of the fabric of the thong, rubbing herself gently, and then pulled it aside to reveal her shaven lips.
She reclined on the divan, and the stage began to rotate very slowly. She rolled over onto her stomach, and her hips — taut and tan — gleamed in the soft light. Taking a deep breath at the tempting sight, John wanted to kiss the fabric of her thong as her hips flexed and moved. The girl pulled and tugged at the little thong, teasing herself and also the viewers. John felt himself harden watching the wanton display.