"With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility"

Today is the birthday of Ernest Lindelöf born 1870 in Helsinki, Finland. He worked on topology and differential equations. He also wrote the history on Scandinavian mathematics.

Today's quote is "The best car safety device is the rear view mirror with a cop in it."
- Dudley Moore

I have a t-shirt that I wear on teacher workshop days. It reads, "I teach MATH, what's your superpower?" I find the shirt funny because many people believe I have a super power in regards to mathematical instruction. I don't. I just love what I do and work hard at it. There are many people who work hard every day and are passionate about their jobs. They should probably get their own super power t-shirt.

My super power is a gift that I have nurtured and practiced since I was a child. I like to daydream. When I daydream, I imagine. I focus. I remove all nonessentials. I can sit in a chair and enter my room. This room contains books, music, movies, and mathematics. This room provides for a solitary existence. To enter my room, I transport myself across the time-space continuum and reside in the lone outpost of my mind. I usually travel quicker when I am reading or doing mathematics.

As a child, I found out I was able to gain access to my room during church services, family reunions, and authoritarian lectures. Boredom was the equivalent of a "radioactive spider bite."

As I have progressed through the teaching vocation, I have been given ample opportunities to practice and hone my exceptional power. My most prolific and intense work in my room has happened at meetings where the discussion centers around the proper syntax in a strategic planning document, a curriculum document, a staff development document, a student handbook, a teacher handbook, a coaching handbook, and a manual on the proper grammatical structure for work related forms.

I have also known to be inattentive during faculty meetings. I have been able to sneak by with my lack of attention by "taking notes" during the meeting. Some of my best mathematics has happened during these meetings.

This bingo card, given to me by colleague, illustrates other opportunities for me to "do math." 

I now have ability to gain access to my sanctuary on demand. I am able to look someone in the eye, nod my head, even carry on a conversation, and not be there. Where am I? Usually, I am sitting in a corner of my burrow, knees folded under my chin, thinking of my beautiful mistress and her most recent gift.

As I have become older, I have noticed that at times my power has become unwieldy. I sometimes slide to my vestibule and not know that I am there. This lack of self-awareness can be troublesome and cause some tense moments with colleagues as I described at the end of "Point A Began in the Shop."

My most recent excursion was both embarrassing and expensive. I was on the way to work early one morning prior to the weekend of Super Bowl LI. I have only two stoplights that I encounter on my particular path to school and between the two of them I noticed a highway patrol car coming up on me fast with lights flashing and siren blaring. "Holy crap," I thought, "there must be a severe accident up ahead!" However, I soon realized the urgent highway patrol officer was indicating to me to "pull over." Confused, I found my driver's license and insurance card and waited for the officer. I rolled down my window and he surveyed the interior of my car. He seemed somewhat confused that there was no cell phone, no coffee container, no breakfast sandwich, or any other item that may have caused the error of my ways.

"Did you see me next to you at the stoplight?" he inquired.  By this time, I left my room and returned to a state of coherent conversion.

"No, I didn't," I replied, still bewildered why I was stopped.

"Did you see that the stoplight was red?" he probed.

"No officer, and I am extremely sorry," I responded, though I now know that I had been preoccupied with a difficult math problem concerning the requirements needed to determine the convergence of a particular infinite series. Her majesty had led me to the room to be charmed by this problem. Due to this distraction, I had tuned out the entire experience of driving to work.

"Well," he chuckled, "you were stopped, but when the left turn signal turned green, you drove straight ahead." He went to his car and returned after an agonizing few minutes and handed me a ticket for $138.

I tweeted this experience and many, including my wife, were concerned that I was texting while driving. No, worse, much worse, I was doing mathematics!

C2 - The Point of No Return

Today is the birthday of Al-Amili born 1547 in Lebanon. He wrote influential works in mathematics, astronomy, and grammar.

Today's quote is by Andrew Lloyd Weber, "The Point of No Return," lyrics from the "Phantom of the Opera".

"You have come here

In pursuit of your deepest urge

In pursuit of that wish which till now has been silent

Silent

I have brought you

That our passions may fuse and merge

In your mind you've already succumbed to me

Dropped all defenses, completely succumbed to me

Now you are here with me, no second thoughts

You've decided, decided

Past the point of no return

No backwards glances

The games we played till now are at an end

Past of all thought of if and when

No use resisting

Abandon thought and let the dream descend

What raging fire shall flood the soul?

What rich desire unlocks its door?

What sweet seduction lies before us

Past the point of no return

The final threshold?

What warm, unspoken secrets will we learn

Beyond the point of no return?"

I recently visited my parents and became lost in the past, their's and mine. Stories swirled about and occasionally, their's bumped into mine. Most often the recollections lazily rotated towards "The Shop," the concrete building that encased my dad's business and was the sanctum that contained my dad's philosophy.

I commented that I had learned at an early age that welding was not to be my occupational choice. "No," my mother reflected, "You would rather read than be in the shop."

Until eighth grade, reading surpassed any activity I was involved in. However, I soon had two events that jolted my conscience in such a cataclysmic way that literature became discarded and I was allured to a mistress that Carl Gauss proclaimed was "the queen of all sciences." 

The Alluring Queen - Mathematics by Farwah Tariq

She was beautiful in structure and mysterious to behold. Her declarations would seem obvious and dismissive but those words could include mysterious riddles and ambiguous teasers such as Zenos' Paradoxes or Schroder's Cat . As my relationship with her became more serious, my perception of her generous nature was replaced with a miserly greed that would only be succumbed by a perseverance that bordered on obsessiveness.

My first experience was due to this obsessive nature. In eighth grade, we were given a mathematics problem. A real problem that extended beyond the arithmetic problems I had experienced in the past. I was introduced to algebra as an eighth grade and my teacher, Evan Schiller, was able to draw me in with its structure and language. Letters replaced numbers but those letters (variables) fell into generalities that included all the numbers I knew at the time.

I can't recall the problem that I was struggling with, only that I agonized over it. That particular problem has been erased by time but I do remember using every waking moment trying to solve the it. I wrote on notebook paper. I doodled on napkins. I found I had a place in my mind that I could go to and close out all intruders. I was not cognizant of delivering newspapers, supper time conversations, or sermons during church. I was able to leave my surroundings if I focussed. This experience was the same experience I encountered when I read a good book. The only difference, I couldn't turn the page. I was locked in the arms of mathematics and drawn to her body. I was held a prisoner of my own desire. The desire to solve the problem.

Eventually, I resigned to let it go, to acknowledge defeat or I thought I had consciously let it go. That night, in my sleep, I solved the problem. The solution was clear. I woke with a start, quickly wrote the solution down. I was elated. I was more than elated. I was addicted. My first thought, "How can I experience this feeling again?" I later found out that this experience of finding solutions during sleep is not unique. This process is called "lucid dreaming".

The thrill of solving a problem that I struggle with and finding its solution was the best high I have ever experienced. I was hooked. My next experience was in geometry. I was studying proofs. I was struggling, again. I had concluded that I had reached a maximum point in my intellectual growth. I was unable to solve a problem involving a proof. Previous experiences in school led me to acknowledge that as each year's topics in mathematics became more challenging I had grown intellectually and I was able to meet the challenge. This year was to be the exception. I was at an impasse. I had worked on this proof at home and at school for days. The solution was beyond my reach so I let it go.

At the moment of letting go, the queen extended her hand, grasped mine, and I entered my room of solitude. As I did, her eyes twinkled, and she laughed. The laugh, though constrained, conveyed the enjoyment of a joker whose solution was directly in front of me if I were to only open my eyes. I did. The rush was immense. The gratification was insurmountable. I was hooked. She then opened her clenched fist and gave me another.