Saturday, April 17, 2010

The Numbers Racket





So this nice hippie lady was cooing over my garden from the sidewalk, and, as I always do, I invited her in. She was delighted. She liked every little thing and she particularly swooned over the raspberries, which were going like gangbusters. "Oh, would you like to pick some?" I asked. "I probably won't keep up. Let me get you a bucket." I got us each a bucket. We picked, we chatted.

Comes to pass that she considers herself very intuitive by nature, and has amplified her abilities by studying numerology. "What is numerology?" I asked, fairly certain, however, that it wasn't going to be anything I'd sign up for. My new friend was enthusiastic. Numerology was only the key to understanding one's role in the universe. She was all ready to demonstrate and asked me what my birthdate was, which I am always happy to divulge. [September 24, 1953, size ten, teal greens and turquoise.] She totted the numbers up.

"Oh! You're a three! Withdrawn, shy, distrustful, and a little on the stingy side," she said, decanting the bucket of raspberries into a paper sack and starting in on the re-fill. "That's unbelievable," I admitted.

"I know!" she exulted. "It's truly amazing. I'm naturally a skeptical person, but the more I read about it, the more I realized how real this is. Pythagoras believed in it, and he, like, invented math!" He was very mathy, that's true. He is credited with discovering the right triangle, which is huge. Before Pythagoras, everybody's tables fell over.

Dave popped into the back yard to meet our new friend. I explained what we were talking about and suggested he toss his own birthday into the hopper. The raspberry lady performed her calculations. "Two. You're like an economics guy, right? Like a financial wizard, maybe a banker?" Dave is not allowed to pay the bills. It's only been recently we allowed him to have his own checking account.

"That's unbelievable," he admitted.

"I know!" she said. We'd picked most of the berries by then, and I told her to come back in a couple days if she wanted more.

"Thanks for all the information," I told her. "The really amazing thing to me is that Pythagoras was able to get his own numbers right. How did he even know he was B.C.?"

"I know!" she said. "Spooky, isn't it?"

I had to look into this numerology business. It was even spookier than I thought. Pythagoras is reported to have been born between 580 and 572 B.C. I think this says more about his mother's abilities than it does his, but true to form, she gets barely a mention. Some oracle or other had predicted, when she was pregnant, that she would give birth to a wise and beautiful man. (Or at least an eight-year-old.) I took a look at a stone bust of him, and he did indeed have chiseled features.

So Pythagoras believed that everything in the universe worth knowing could be expressed mathematically, and that one's own numbers revealed much about oneself, including one's past lives. The best website I was able to find, based on the saturation of rainbow colors in the wallpaper, also made mention of Edgar Cayce, the "Sleeping Prophet Of Virginia Beach." As the Napping Diva of NE 29th Avenue, I had to investigate further.

Cayce was a psychic who reportedly had the "ability to put himself into some kind of self-induced sleep state by lying down on a couch, closing his eyes, and folding his hands over his stomach." This was stunning. I just so happen to have very similar abilities, except that I tend to list to the side and drool a little. Cayce was also reported to have been able to read the Akashic Records. I had to look that up. Turns out the Akashic Records are like a library of everything that has ever happened; like, as Wikipedia has it, a "universal filing system which records every occurring thought, word and action." It's the Internet! Which is just what I was using! Unbelievable. Well. I was sold.

I plugged some of my numbers into the online numerology form and read the results avidly. It cautioned me to avoid depression, jealousy and worry. You can't hang a price tag on that kind of advice. Then: "You aren't the type to retire because you need to keep expanding and enlarging." I felt really let down. I am not only retired, but totally the type, and if I'm still expanding and enlarging, I don't see how it's any business of the Numerology website.

I'm not going to give them my credit card numbers.

42 comments:

  1. You may not see yourself as "withdrawn, shy, distrustful, and a little on the stingy side," but you're clearly not as self-aware as you'd like to think, Murr.

    Let's do a tally to test my theory:

    1) Withdrawn--You let her in to your garden, as opposed to assuming that she had as much right to explore it as you do.

    2) Shy--You kept your inner thoughts, particularly the negative ones, to yourself rather than being open and honest.

    3) Distrustful--You were quite skeptical about numerology, enough so that instead of taking her word for it, you researched it later.

    4) Stingy--This is the biggie. You didn't offer to pick your berries for her, wash and bag them, and then carry them to her house along with some sponge cake and whipped cream. You merely offered to "share" your berries, as long as she was willing to do the work herself.

    So it seems to me that on an interplanetary psychic scale of 1 to 10, you're a solid 3, proving that numerology is a solid science.

    But I could be wrong. I need to go put myself into a sleep-like trance on the couch, and see if the spirit guides have further insight to offer me. Usually, they leave distinctive trails of drool on my chin, which I'm able to "read" like tea leaves, or palms.

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  2. Back in the day I used to work in a so-called mystical bookshop where numerology was highly esteemed. Unfortunately nobody seemed to be very good with the financial numbers and the bookshop was constantly about to go bust. Nowadays I prefer to put my trust in PIN numbers.

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  3. I'm ashamed, but I'm not getting the "chiseled features" joke. Hint?

    That was all very spooky. I think I'll try putting myself into a sleep-like trance right now. As soon as I'm done reading the Akashic Records...

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  4. Delightful.

    Tongue planted firmly in cheek you take us on a wonderful esoteric tour, even including Edgar Cayce. Back in my younger years I consumed books about Cayce. I tended to grab on to the odd and nifty back then, and Cayce fit the bill. Now I find he was using the Internet before it was even there. Truly amazing.

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  5. Thanks for my morning chuckle. Seeing that it's 4+17 today, I divine that you are older than 21, very friendly, and a curious sort.

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  6. Oh sweet angels of the numbers! So it's Saturday morning -quiet, I might add- and now here I am, much more spiritaully aware because I've now been on the innernet figuring out my numbers and those of my children and John too.Had NO IDEA when I woke up this morning I would be doing this! Weird, eh? Signed, 3 (Yup! I'm a 3 too!)

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  8. Trying again with my comment. If I didn't know that the sister of my children's father was a nun in California, and therefore the only lucid sibling on that branch of the family tree, I would think that your hippie chick neighbor was an auntie to my blessings. I know way more than I ever wanted to know about the Akashic records. And Edgar Cayce. And numerology. And several sorts of astrology. And health food. And get rich quick schemes. And conspiracy theories [remember Mel Gibson's character? my brother-in-law, only better looking, and I will never think of Captain Picard quite the same way again]. Thank you, Murr, for my first belly-laugh of the day.

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  9. It seems that people are staying up all night just waiting for your next peals of perfection.

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  10. Can I come over and pick raspberries? I promise not to rave about numerology, Pythagoras, or Edgar Cayce. And you can totally take a nap afterward. Pretty please?

    Oh wait. I forgot you were withdrawn, shy and mistrustful. Forget I asked.

    Thanks for the giggles,
    ♥Spot

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  11. Of course you can likely "predict" my response... unfortunately I bemoan that a goodly portion of our population seems to wander around daily in a sleep-like trance.

    The slightly devious part of me would have had a bit of fun with the Numerology lady, though - a quick Google then give her Ted Bundy's birthday telling her it's a relative, then see how she added up the numbers. I'll bet he was a "people person" who made friends easily.

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  12. I am just barely twenty-one, but because I am shy and distrustful, I throw people off with lots of photos of an old lady on my blog. And you can have fun with people like the numbers lady without their even knowing it. That's the beauty part: sugar coating and a snarky center. Hello Suburban! No hints. Spot, you are most welcome. I predict the raspberries will be ready in late June.

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  13. Considering that the first of your blogs that I ever read was the one titled "A Little Flap of Skin" (from which, I might add, I am only NOW recovering), this one hits it out of the park too (to coin a phrase).
    You are too funny. Thank god I had neither coffee nor wine in my mouth as I read, else I would have spewed said liquid all over the computer screen.

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  14. And this Pythagorus inventor bloke; he would've had rock hard abs too do you suppose?

    Greetings from a newly subscribed Australian fan.
    You're a real tonic!

    Nan M

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  15. You bad little stingy thing, giving away all your raspberries.

    I love the way your mind works. You are hilarious.

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  16. I had a friend's brother expound on past lives once. He had definitive proof that we all had past lives. Irrefutable proof. The proofiest of all proof. I went for the bait and asked what the proof was. "I see them in people's auras" he said.
    Oh well, I asked!

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  17. Kat, some people have really proofy auras (speaking of bait). Thanks, ellen and KGMom, and welcome aboard, Anonymous! We need some international flair to class up the joint.

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  18. Can I go over to SC and tell her about chiseled features? Please?

    I am Her Ladyship of Laying Around of Lower California.

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  19. My mother, the math professor, is also very mathy and, I think, will greatly appreciate your theory on the inability of tables to remain upright before Pythagoras.

    Let us know if the raspberry lady comes back.

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  20. I dunno. It just doesn't add up.

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  21. Sometimes when I can't sleep I listen to late night talk radio, where mathy numerologists are often explaining to callers why they are miserable...maybe the raspberry lady is getting her info there. Pretty handy, solving all life's mysteries with quick addition. Not like that bogus astrology stuff.

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  22. I know quite a bit about Atlantic Records. Does that count?

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  23. Oh, Murr. I just love your blog. Chiseled features! Snort! I'm dying to know what number I am not, also.

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  24. You need to go find that hippie lady and get your raspberries back so her predictions about your true nature can be borne out even more amazingly. Remind me to tell you about the Sufis who came to stay.

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  25. I can't believe you are all enjoying the joke without me. Meanies. I'm taking my blog and going home.

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  26. NO no! Don't go! You class up the joint, too! Katydidnot, better pop on over there and take care of things.
    Thanks, Barb. I'm going out on a limb and saying you are not: four.

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  27. Suburban Correspondent, look at the bust of Pythagoras (carved out of stone, if I don't miss my guess), and then, imagine how it was created. Hint, hint. Jackpot to you, if you get it!

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  28. I'll send you a Ouji board for Christmas, and I think you should learn horoscopy too. You can never be too safe when it comes to your future.

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  29. My daughter is into Tarot. Maybe I should let her 'read my cards.' Maybe she is as wise as the numbers lady. Glad to meet you, thanks for visiting my blog. I am adding you to my reader, so that when next I am "having an Edgar Cayce moment," I can tell Hubs I read it here.

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  30. I've always had a thing about number 11 and it being a positive ting in my life as I see it all the time. Thanks for your comment on my blog.

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  31. Huh. So, it somehow *knew* you liked to lie on the couch in a certain position (it didn't mention the drooling, but hey...no-one's perfect) and it said you could never be happy retiring...which you took to mean you'd have to keep working...but maybe it meant "retiring" as in "sleeping". It's actually amazingly accurate...see??

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  32. Love the moth in the blue bowl! How fab!

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  33. I like your sense of adventure! What were Pootie's numbers?

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  34. But kathryn, I am a perfect drooler.
    Penny, the Pootster is always number one.

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  35. This is wonderful, Murr. And yes, I am extremely behind in my blog-reading.

    I used to take rather unkind pleasure in making up a new birth sign at every party, and gravely listening to my interlocutor exclaim about how I was just every inch a taurus/leo/aquarius/whatever I said I was.

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  36. Here via Robert. I wish I were more astounded by most people's tendencies to believe ridiculous things, but it seems rampant.

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  37. Wonderful capture of the butterfly. Impressive size and detail.

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  38. But kathryn, I am a perfect drooler.
    Penny, the Pootster is always number one.

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  39. Wonderful capture of the butterfly. Impressive size and detail.

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  40. I dunno. It just doesn't add up.

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  41. You may not see yourself as "withdrawn, shy, distrustful, and a little on the stingy side," but you're clearly not as self-aware as you'd like to think, Murr.

    Let's do a tally to test my theory:

    1) Withdrawn--You let her in to your garden, as opposed to assuming that she had as much right to explore it as you do.

    2) Shy--You kept your inner thoughts, particularly the negative ones, to yourself rather than being open and honest.

    3) Distrustful--You were quite skeptical about numerology, enough so that instead of taking her word for it, you researched it later.

    4) Stingy--This is the biggie. You didn't offer to pick your berries for her, wash and bag them, and then carry them to her house along with some sponge cake and whipped cream. You merely offered to "share" your berries, as long as she was willing to do the work herself.

    So it seems to me that on an interplanetary psychic scale of 1 to 10, you're a solid 3, proving that numerology is a solid science.

    But I could be wrong. I need to go put myself into a sleep-like trance on the couch, and see if the spirit guides have further insight to offer me. Usually, they leave distinctive trails of drool on my chin, which I'm able to "read" like tea leaves, or palms.

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