This may surprise a lot of people, but I was unclear on the exact definition of insider trading until very recently. I had a general idea, of course, thanks to that Martha Stewart case a few years ago, but if you had asked me to provide a definition, I would have had produced little more than vague, buzzword-laden sentence fragments and sweeping hand gestures.
Then, the other night, I was out to dinner with my dad and brother Ted as a sort of last family hurrah before said brother moved to New York (if you’re reading this, I’m very happy that you landed such an excellent job with great perks and advancement opportunities etc etc etc, but I’m still mad at you for abandoning me). My dad was scheduled to make a trip to Orange County in the next couple of days, and being a naturally curious person, I asked him what it would entail.
‘We’re working with a lender down there and a private equity firm that’s going to give them $X million of capital,’ he told me.
Private equity! That was interesting.
‘Which lender?’ I asked. My father shook his head.
‘I can’t tell you that.’
‘Oh, come on,’ I protested. ‘Why not? It’s not like I’ll shout it from the rooftops or tell Rob.’ (My boss, whose commentary is read by tens of thousands of people on a daily basis.)
‘No, I can’t tell you,’ my dad repeated.
I was a touch put out. Was there a general perception that I couldn’t be trusted with secrets? That I wasn’t worthy of being privy to the company’s goings-on? I was about to get really offended when Ted spoke up.
‘If he told you, that would be, like, a textbook instance of insider trading,’ my brother helpfully pointed out.
Oh.
Moral of the story, if someone you know is about to coordinate a deal with a public company that involves a lot of capital, don’t be offended that they won’t give you the details. They’re probably just trying to not get put in prison for white-collar crime.
On a totally unrelated note (or is it?), I type this from the beautiful island of Maui, one of the most stunning of Hawaii’s numerous stunning islands. The ocean’s waves are crashing softly on a spit of golden sand and making that peaceful rustling noise I love so much, and a line of slender palms are waving their fronds in the light breeze. The air feels the exact temperature of my skin so that I blend into the summer evening like an unwitting ninja.
I am back in the tropics, and I am very, very happy.
Hawaii was utterly last minute. My friend Clare texted me last Friday with a message that read: ‘Hawaii 15-22. are you free?’ I’m not sure what I texted back, but I think it was along the lines of ‘fuck yes,’ give or take ten exclamation points. A ticket was booked, I cancelled an appointment or two, my shorts were washed, and that was it.
Clare and I can be found wreaking havoc in San Francisco most weekends, reveling in the fact that we can legally drink alcohol in this country, but we go way back, all the way to the halcyon days of the mid-2000s. We both attended The Branson School, where we sat our myriad AP tests and had class in the glen in nice weather and occasionally skipped class to go to the beach and got told constantly how vital it was that we go to a Prestigious University™.
In no particular order, things I adore about being in the tropics:
1. It’s hot. Duh. Not having to wear a jacket at night is one of life’s great pleasures, as is being able to walk around in a bikini shoeless. In temperate climates, I sort of feeling like everyone else is operating at their peak and I, with my blue lips and chattering teeth, am at something of a disadvantage. When I come to the tropics, I’m enlivened by the heat, not unlike a warm-blooded reptile, and frolic around with boundless energy as everyone else drags. The view is nice from the other side.
2. It’s humid. This means hair and fingernails that grow faster (!), better digestion, improved circulation, soft skin, and a glorious feeling of exhaustion at the end of the day. Long ago I discovered that I physically function much better in humid weather, so my body feels fucking amazing right now, to put it indelicately.
3. Delicious fruit. Papayas, pineapples, guavas, those tiny sweet bananas, and my personal favourite, coconuts, are all present here in abundance. They also taste much, much better when they’re not carted across an ocean.
4. The dim mauve coolness of the early morning before the sun rises. For some reason I can’t fully explain, I really love that before-the-waking-people time of relative freshness. I imagine it to be the time when those who need to get things done bustle about and do them so that they’re out of the way before the lazy heat rolls out and the folk on holiday whose to-do lists consist of ‘read crappy book’ awaken.
5. Bright colours. The flowers, the birds, the ocean, the houses. You’re allowed to paint your house persimmon in the tropics. You’re allowed to wear lime green without people scowling like you’re hurting their eyes. I don’t even wear bright colours most of the time, having retreated into a preference for exiting shade like dark blue, hunter green, and grey, but I find this immensely cheering.
6. The architecture. Tile floors, high ceilings, old creaky wooden fixings, dilapidated shingles worn down by heavy, damp air—all unassumingly glorious. I love that sense of ‘it’s not perfect, but it does its job, so whatever.’ Cold weather requires a sturdy house, a powerful heating system, plush carpeting, and lots of thick-legged furniture, in my opinion, otherwise you risk a Siberian gulag-type vibe. Having had a lot of experience of what it’s like to be mind-numbingly and painfully cold, I panic at the thought of being in a rickety house where air whistles through the cracks in the foundation.
7. The excuse to drink particular cocktails. Ordering a daiquiri, mai tai, or, heaven forbid, a pina colada in the middle of Tokyo or London or New York is kind of gauche. Even in California, it’s kind of gauche. Being in the tropics, this is not only acceptable but encouraged (I pointedly ignored my mother’s observation that ‘pina coladas are pretty fattening, you know,’ which she told me over the phone this morning).
8. Geckos. They’re cute. They make funny noises.
9. It’s green. There is something very satisfying about existing amidst miles of greenery after having existed in an arid landscape for a long time.
10. Being allowed to run late. In Indonesia, one often hears the term jam karet, which translates literally to ‘rubber time.’ In Hawaii, it’s ‘island time.’ The technical and much less charming term is polychronocity, a polychromic culture being one where a deadlines or appointment are really just suggestions. Singapore is one of the very few tropical places that comes to mind where a monochronic culture exists, but in places like Tanzania, Guatemala, Sri Lanka, or the majority of the Caribbean, you can pretty much run twenty minutes late and no one cares. As someone who is perpetually running twenty minutes late, I appreciate this very much.
