So Says The Mouse In My Hair

Math From My Past

Ever get random bouts of nostalgia for that stuff you learned in high school that as been swept from your brain in more recent years? Sure the vital stuff stuck around. I could tell you probably two things about the constitution of the United States and its history. Might be able to cough up a memory of Crime and Punishment. Could explain those little dominant recessive gene charts we had to do in biology class.

But there used to be more than all that, remember? And no, I don’t miss the rest of it. Unless I learned it between Algebra and Calculus. I noticed that today when I tried to re-teach myself those beginner lessons in first derivatives. I was looking for that equasion in the back of my brain. Not the cheat sheet one where the first derivative of 2x is 2 just because you learned the rule. The one where you subtract the two Ys from each other and divide that by the two Xs subtracted from each other as the second X approaches the first one.

I learned how to write all that stuff out once, and I even learned how to teach it to other people later, but it’s way way gone now.

And it gets worse. I don’t even remember how to find an equation for a line. I was studying my old Calc book and it referred to the "point slope form" and my first thought was, "I used to know that, but it’s gone now." It’s sad really.

So what’s the tragedy here? I know what you’re thinking. Something along the lines of Ahhhhhhh!!!! Are you insane?

Yes. And your point here is…

As a sick demented person, yes. I had lots of fun in school. Yes. I even enjoyed learning some of the more interesting random pieces, like that a star fish pukes its stomach out of its body to digest food then sucks it back in again after it’s full. And yes, I found calculus to be amusing and I miss knowing all those silly formulas and equations and all that jazz.

Two roads diverged in my woods and I thought I could not take them both. Is such the case? Will I forever be doomed to the literary world, completely cut off from the land of Xs and Alphas? But I see a gentle ray of hope, my future lies in education, maybe not the education I had previously envisioned.

What if my lot in life is to delve into that dark void that is the pubescent human? An interesting but mostly just frightening thought. Plus math.

You’re right. I am insane. Where is that mouse when I really need some help?

posted by Sarah Eliza @ 6:53 PM