If 6 Was 9

It All Adds Up

Men have thought the prospect strange
demonic scaring as they woke
from a ravishing crystalline dream
of abstract Eternities
to touch the edge of Change
where all Numbers twist and break. . .

-- Jack Lindsay, The Origins of Alchemy in Graeco-Roman Egypt


Yesterday, at one point I was presented with a column of 15 or so 3- and 4-digit numbers which needed to be added up, then averaged. I reflexively began to reach for a calculator, and then some existential something-or-other made me stop myself. Was it Jesus? Maybe it was. Who knows? All I know is I was suddenly overcome with the urge to add these numbers up, and then derive their average, manually. And, not having pencil and paper handy (not having had pencil and paper handy in years), I resolved to complete the task entirely in my head.

I have this sort of idiot savant skill at basic math. I can add -- or subtract, or multiply, or divide -- extremely long columns of numbers, carrying over and everything, all in my head, and at tremendous speed, with accuracy. It is not a talent I developed or anything, I just had it from the beginning, as far back as I can remember. From whence it came I can only guess.

I never was much for showing off my odd little skill, because it did not seem very remarkable to me. But my elementary school teachers began to wonder how I was turning in my tests half an hour ahead of everyone else, and getting all the questions right. Naturally, they suspected I was cheating some way.

This all came to a head in third grade, when one day my teacher gave me a big fat red “F” on a math test on which I’d answered all but 2 of 30 problems correctly, in record time. She openly accused me of cheating, and refused to even consider changing the grade. Dismayed, I finally told my parents about it. And they went ballistic, met with the school principal and everything (I was dubious about all this, I just wanted the grade I’d honestly earned.) It ended up I had to stand in the principal’s office, in front of him and my parents, while my teacher rattled off a series of about 40 numbers at me. When she was done I gave her the sum total of the numbers, which I'd been adding in my head as she went. The total was correct. My principal was very impressed, but I think my teacher just started hating me even more.

Anyway, all the kids eventually heard about this throwdown/showdown (not from me), and for awhile I was kind of a legend in the third grade. Not to bad thing to be, everything considered. The only reason those kids did not start calling me ‘The Human Calculator’ or something similar is because back then calculators weren’t very prevalent at all, and the ones there were approximated the size and weight of the front quarter panel on a 1966 Dodge Charger. Probably cost as much, too.

Luckily, none of my classmates thought to call me The Human Abacus, or The Human Slide Rule. The Human Comptometer kind of has a nice ring to it, but no one thought of that one, either.

I once impressed a very attractive girl with my addition skills, so much so she started dating me.

My freshman year of high school, there was a really pretty girl in my class, obviously so far out of my reach I never even dreamt of taking her out. I didn't mind standing around looking at her, though. She worked at an ice cream place after school, and I happened to be there one evening when she was closing. She couldn’t make her cash register balance, even after numerous attempts. So I helped her quickly recount the money and receipts, and then everything balanced out as it should have. She was impressed and seemed very turned on by this, so I asked her out. Even then, I knew an opportunity when I saw one; especially one that walked right up and slapped me in the face.

Alas, a romance based on someone’s math skills is generally not destined to last very long, and this one didn’t, either. But I still remember it all with some fondness. It was the first time I realized that some of the stuff I was being forced to learn in high school really did have practical applications.

My vaunted skill at mathematics came to a screeching halt the next year. That was when I first encountered “higher math”, in this case trigonometry. Try though I might, my brain was simply not wired to grasp the more abstract and esoteric concepts of trig and calculus and matrices and whatever the hell else lay beyond that. My facility for mathematics simply went to a certain level, and then stopped cold. And that was it.

Suddenly, my skill at adding numbers was obsolete. It was, I realized, about as relevant -- and useful -- as blacksmithing, or alchemy.

What did it all mean? Would my youthful confidence, flowering but still delicate, be utterly destroyed? How would I cope? Well, for one thing, I was going to have to figure out a new and better way to attract girls.

*****

Nowadays, we are rarely asked to do much math at all. Calculators are everywhere, from one’s laptop to one’s phone to one’s watch, to spreadsheets that do everything for you. No one has to add up anything, anymore.

We are better for it, no doubt. But still, it is fun to go back and try out the old skills again, like I did yesterday. I added up those numbers, and averaged them, all in about 15 seconds, in my head. No pencil and paper, no trees had to die. It was gratifying to find my old skill intact, to know I still "had it." I started thinking, I wish I knew where that pretty girl from the ice cream parlor lives now. I'd go over to her house and show her, after all these years, that I still knew how to turn her on. Okay, maybe that was not such a great idea, but. . .

Stop punching the keys on your phone or your watch or calculator. Add up some numbers in your head. Do some long division, on paper. Figure up a batting average, or an on base percentage. Set yourself free, momentarily at least, from the drowsy ease and convenience of the silicone chip.

By all means, reconnect with the numbers. Follow them. Go with them, all the way out to where the air is thin and there is no light, out to the place where the numbers twist and break.

Some people will tell you, that is the place where God lives.

*****