The Investment

During these difficult financial times it is always a problem deciding upon the proper investment strategy. Of course that has never been the case with cowboys. That is probably because they usually don’t seem to worry about it one way or the other. The concept of saving for the future in some sort of a logical manner usually eludes them.

            That pretty much describes Jake. All he ever wanted to do was work around a bunch of old cows. His life revolved around two things: working around some livestock and spending Saturday night (or any other night) on the town. His friends and relatives continually badgered him to invest at least a small part of his wages in IRAs, blue chip stocks, or some other similar safe investment. But Jake turned a deaf ear to all their well meaning advice.

            Finally, the pressure became so great that he was forced to give in to their blandishments. After a particularly successful poker game one Saturday night Jake decided to put his winnings and a portion of his wages, which he drew against for the next six months, into some good stock. After considerable study the old roughneck made AT&T his choice. It seemed like a good bet.

            Those close to him remained curious concerning the success of his venture and they questioned him closely about its performance, but Jake remained noncommital on the entire subject. Then after about six months he fell into a fit of depression and finally opened up about the situation. As he explained it to his friends:

            “I took your advice and bought into the best stock available. I put all my money into AT&T. It started off just fine when he placed third at Santa Anita, but that blamed horse hasn’t been in the money since and I had to sell him at a loss.”