I’m actually not that worried, for several reasons.

First, although Wall Street is in a tizzy, I’m not sure that a longer look at the financial recovery bill is such a bad idea. After all the Bush administration rushed the PATRIOT Act through and look what that got us. So I believe thinking things through before taking actions is a good idea. Especially by individuals who were telling us up until a couple weeks ago that the economy was in fine shape.

But primarily I’m not stressed because my grandmother is taking things in stride.

My grandmother’s family lost almost everything in the Great Depression. The whole family even had to move in with her oldest brother, when they thought they would lose their house (they did keep their house, but that’s about all the kept.) (How’d you like to have your parents and most of your seven siblings move in with you?)

In the 80s, my grandmother inadvertently put her money into a savings and loan. (The S&L lead its customers to think they were FDIC insured.) The S&L tanked, and it was only after years and the intercession of the state of Maryland that she got her money back. (The governor said that because people were tricked into believing that their accounts were backed by Maryland, it was the state’s responsibility to help recover the money.)

So twice in her life my grandmother has lost much due to the vagaries of the market. And twice she has gotten through it fine, even if things were difficult for a period.

Her attitude towards current events, despite the fact that some of her investments from when she sold her house are doing as well as you’d expect, lead me to be able to take a deep breath, consider our financial position, and say, y’know? We’re gonna be okay. We’ve got family and we all look out for each other and that’s what gets you through.