The reference is to Barbara Kingsolver’s book titled High Tide in Tucson, HarperCollins, 1995. In the Library this week the cover of the book was a crab and knowing Tucson is in the desert, my interest was captured. The story is Mrs. Kingsolver went to the Bahamas (the island between Florida and Cuba) and the crab was hiding in the shells which Mrs. Kingsolver collected and did not noticed under she arrived in Tucson. What would you do with the crab? Take in the desert and release it? throw it in the garbage? take it to the river or lake and release it? or keep it? The family decided to keep it and learn about and from the crab.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, when you first buy a stock you are hoping the price goes up and you will become wealthier. It happens, but sometimes you venture into other stocks for example dividend paying stocks. The stock price does not jump up or the reason you bought it does not cause a large jump but you receive a dividend and it now seems worth holding. Other stocks are similar to gold which has no return and maybe the price has fallen but it could go up. The wonderful thing about a dividend paying stock is even if the price does not go up in the short term, the dividend is being paid and as time goes on, you will be rewarded in the capital appreciation aspect. Some will buy for the dividend first, some will buy on future price increases, some will buy for defensive reasons, whatever the reason the added feature of a dividend has been proven to help in the long run. While you decide what is the next greatest thing to go up in price. In the meantime a healthy total return is being received.

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions