Back in the day, people used to buy what was called a “Dream Book” which interpreted your dreams into numbers. The numbers were relayed to the bookies, numbers writers, or whatever gambling outlet paid off on your dream. A dream with a baby was 123; a cat was 414. I think the philosopher Carl Jung had a theory about the power of 4 – a stable number. Cats land on their feet too. The point – it wasn’t about the math; just the meaning.

Today is January 1, 2009. Nine is interpreted by some to be a spiritual number. I just asked my sister why – “Because it’s complete. The complete whole number before you get to 10” — double digits.

Cuba celebrates their 50th anniversary of the Revolution today when the revolutionaries, led by Fidel Castro, made their entrance into Havana officially ending Fulgencia Batista’s rule. The lead up to this event came together for me in the film “The Godfather II.” I found this scene of a meeting set before New Years eve night 1958. Check out who’s seated at the table of power, how invicible and certain they all appear.

2009 will also be the 40th anniversary of Woodstock. Can’t say I was there, but I did see the movie sometime after. I heard the soundtrack a lot. I used to confuse it with the concert in Monterey, CA. I’ll probably get flamed for that. I do know the difference now. This clip is with Jimi Hendrix.

Without the assistance of a dream book, we used to say years with “8s” (1968) were devious. Those “1s” are getting ominous too (1941, 2001).

2008 turned the numbers theory on its head in so many ways. There will be an historic inauguration in 2009 of the 44th President who was elected in 2008. Barack Obama’s victory was all about the numbers and David Plouffe proved it so. 2008 introduced another numbers guru, Nate Silver and his website www.fivethirtyeight.com. Howard Dean had a Dream Book of his own, the 50 state strategy. People thought his numbers were wack; turned out it was more than just luck. Al Franken (D) may eek out a Senatorial victory over Sen. Norm Coleman (R) in MN by just a few numbers. Maybe it is about the math afterall.

Somehow the math didn’t add up for Wall Street and Main Street in 2008. Perhaps it was the curse of the “8.” Wall Street had a formula both a mathamatical and scientific formula for a boom market; but apparently “meaning” wasn’t in the equation. Integrity was missing too. Human nature has a way of trumping the math.