Hasn’t this been fun? I like it when the markets go up 10 percent in less than a month.

The problem is that the volatility, which no one likes, is continuing.

Some people are convinced we are in a Bear Market. Market action this year from peak to trough is a downward spiral of about 21 percent in the Standard & Poor’s 500 stock index. As of the end of October year to date, the Standard & Poor’s 500 is about break even for the year.

Now, as volatile as the markets have been, that number can change big time in just a few moments.

A couple of months ago the small cap and mid cap indexes were even more volatile with peak to troughs of about 30 percent. This has not been fun for anyone.

The S&P 500 rallied more than 10 percent in October just to give some back.

Now you and I like up rallies; what we don’t like is down six or seven percent in a few days. It seems like that has been happening a lot and investors don’t like it.

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If you had been trekking the Himalayas the past nine months and you just came back to civilization and picked up The Wall Street Journal, you would just say, “Oh well, the market is about even for the year, no big deal.”

The problem is that most investors are subjected to all these talking heads on TV and it scares them to death. What is causing all of this unrest in the markets?

This is what I think. Investors are concerned about a handful of issues. Most are concerned about our deficit created over the past couple of years. Most are concerned about our deadlock in Congress. Some are concerned about unemployment, most are concerned about economic situations outside of the U.S. as well as upheaval in some countries.

I still have a great deal of confidence in America, and I think we will solve our problems as we always have done in the past.

Now I could be wrong, and maybe we should all be buying canned goods and ammunition. But I think it will take some time.

It seems to me that to a large extent our markets are being roiled by a lot of things over which we have no control. And to that degree a lot of the issues are emulating from outside the U.S. and are affecting our markets.

There is nothing we can do about that. We sell goods and services all around the world so we could be affected by those happenings.

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As I look at market numbers and commodity prices, they are unlike anything you and I have seen recently. Let’s take a look at the stock market, again, as of the end of October.

After 10 months, the S&P is about even, the Russell 2000 index of small stocks is down 5.4 percent, the S&P Mid Cap 400 index of midsized companies is down 2.1 percent.

Those of us who have diversified portfolios own foreign investments and the Global Dow, not including the U.S., is down more than 10 percent.

The broad market as measured by the Wilshire 5000 is down about 2.5 percent. It was up more than 11.5 percent in October. Hooray for rallies.

Without October the numbers would not be good.

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In the commodities arena, gold is up about 22 percent, natural gas is down 10 percent, crude oil is up about 2 percent, and the DJ-UBS Commodity index is down 7.95 percent, which is good news for most consumers.

Corn had a big run, then down 10 percent and appears headed back up. Cattle continues to wander trading in a 10 percent range up and down, coffee was through the roof but has traded down about 20 percent from the high. Now I can afford more caffeine.

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I was grumbling about something the other day and the wife asked me what was going on. I told her that it drives me crazy to see all the kids riding a bike with a helmet, gloves, elbow pads and knee pads, nose pads, ear pads and goggles.

Kids, in my view, are being babied. When I was young, if you tried out for an athletic team of some sort and you were not good enough to make the team, you did not make it. It was kinda like life.

She rolled her eyes backward, and I told her I was going to run through the house with a pair of scissors. She ddn’t think that was funny.

Howie Pentony is a Saxonburg client portfolio manager.