Dow 10,000

For the past several weeks or so, the Dow Jones Industrial Average has been flirting and dancing with the 10,000 point mark, first approaching it, then backing away. I've been watching this dance with anticipation: Will it make it? Will it fall back down? What's going to happen next? Of course, with the stock market, you never know what will happen next, but like everybody who follows it at all, I like to guess.

A little history: the Dow hit 10,000 points for the first time ever ten years ago, in 1999. I remember hearing about it on the radio; people were partying on Wall Street. Since that point was reached, the Dow went on to surpass 11,000, 12,000, and finally hitting its all-time record high somewhere above 14,000 points. A lot of stuff happened in between those times. Then, last year in October, the market plunged us into a recession (it was a lot more complex then what I'm describing, of course, but this is good enough for the purposes of my blog), hitting 6,000-some odd points, before, in March, the market began slowly but steadily climbing its way back up.

So here we are now. I love reading articles by the bears-- "This doesn't mean anything! We could take another plunge at any time!" --which is of course true, nobody knows what's going to happen next. But for now, I like to be optimistic. We're on our way back up to unprecedented heights.

And I think Wall Street should buy lunch for everyone in America.