Funny About Numbers

I am absolutely not a numbers person, but I do appreciate some things that are funny about numbers. There are times I especially like; 12:34 (get it, 1,2,3,4?) and of course 3:33 and 12:21. I woke the other day at 6:18 and was reminded that 618 was my college boyfriend’s room number. I can still recall many of my high school friends’ phone numbers, though since the advent of cell phones I don’t know anyone’s numbers, not even my daughter’s. Numbers remind me of birthdays and songs (76 Trombones, Love Potion Number Nine, which reminds me of the Beatles Revolution Number 9, Number 9, Number 9.)

And speaking of nine, when I learned casting out nines it felt like magic, in fact most math feels like magic to me; magic I can’t understand. I haven’t been able to help my daughter with math homework since she was in seventh grade, and the other day when she asked about something related to quadratic equations I just cracked up. “Have you just met me?” I asked. I try to understand, I really do, but it’s not how my brain processes things.

As a teenager I struggled with math. I was managing to get through tenth grade geometry, and then that year someone stole the answers to the New York State regents exams, and ours was cancelled.  There was great rejoicing on my block, but my brother-in-law told me— when we were talking about it today, that he was disappointed. In eleventh grade I took algebra and trigonometry. I had an awful teacher, and struggled all year. My mother accused me of failing on purpose (I swore then and swear now, this was not true) she was a super numbers person, and I don’t think she could understand my difficulties.

In New York state if you passed the annual regents exam you passed the class for the year regardless of your grades for the year. I had two tutors (both still friends of mine) and worked as hard as I could; my teacher was no help at all. On the day of the test all my friends were rooting for me. I did the best I could knowing all I needed was a grade of 66 to get credit for the class. When the results came I was nervous opening mine. I had gotten a 35 (out of 100), a whole school year wasted, time I could have used to read or draw, or almost anything rather than endure the torture of that class.

In culinary school I was required to take a seven day class called culinary math which seemed daunting at first, but as it turned out, I was a culinary math whiz. I aced every test, didn’t have to take the final, and went on to (limited) fame as the math tutor of the CIA. I have  made peace with my limited numbers skills. I can do the math I need t0, and I have never missed the skills I failed to acquire back in trig class in 1975. The story of my epic Regents fail has been one I tell often. Numbers are funny, and I can be funny about numbers.