Math Is Apparently Art

It took two weeks. They were the longest two weeks of my life, but there they were, already past, and there I was, passed out in a coma. Or something like it.

It all started when Andrew told me that math was an art. Now, I’ve always been into expression. The emotions and thoughts and ideas and perceptions that all of us have are painted with the most brilliant colors when they are expressed: expressed by writing, by art, by anything and everything. Except, obviously, math. Or not so obviously, since Andrew was convinced that math was also a way of expression. During those two weeks I admit that I bitterly commented that math was an expression…of everything dark and morbid and disgusting. But that was just me being pessimistic because, well, two weeks is a long time.

“Practice makes perfect.”                           

“You can’t practice if you have no motivation, and you can’t be perfect if it’s not your gift.” To me, my argument sounded perfectly logical. The only problem was that his argument also sounded logical, more than mine.

“Fine. But give me two weeks. You practice math concepts, everyday, all day. Then at the end of the two weeks, you’ll understand that mathematics is a way of thinking, and as such a form of expression. You have this idea that it isn’t because math to you is just something you have to do; it’s something that is a necessary evil, and you struggle with the practicality of it. But if it was second nature, it would be a form of art. Just give me two weeks.”

Now anyone else who had suggested that I waste two entire weeks of my life doing something as atrocious as math “everyday, all day” would have gotten a free ride and recommendation to the nearest mental institution. But this was Andrew. And Andrew had always had this weird but magnetic vibe that usually made me game to any of his stupid ideas. At this point I’d already subjected myself to a year of learning the Mandarin language per Andrew’s assurance that I was going to be a newspaper editor with the inherent need to know Mandarin. He’d also joyfully supervised an entire week of my eating only beets. He’d heard of someone who turned orange after eating only carrots, and he figured he’d see if a differentiated antecedent concluded in a like result. (It worked, although it’s debatable whether the results were an effect of something other than beet juice. But that is a story for another time.)

So like I said, two weeks was a long time, made longer by Andrew’s constant lessons and deplorable encouragements that only served to make me mad and fueled my desire to prove him wrong. Which, ironically, resulted in the same repercussions as encouragement, so I guess he knew what he was doing.

The only problem with all of these math  problems (literally problems) was that as I grew increasingly (and annoyingly) familiar with them, I began to (dare I admit it?) actually like these math problems. There was a sense of conquering each problem. But more than that, there was a uniformity in math that intrigued me. No matter how you changed the numbers, the way forward was consistent. I recognized (to my horror) that the rest of my life was becoming easier as I began to think in patterns and logical conclusions rather than subjective emotions and theory. Math had a certain strange appeal that scared me. But it was Andrew, so I pretended that I hated it. And I did, I guess. But in some weird way, I loved it, too. Math was now a part of me, and the things I did were duly influenced by some of its basic fundamentals. And as I began to build on those concepts, I began to see and think in a new way, and express myself as such.

Andrew had done it. Math was a form of expression. Math was art.

Two weeks is a long time. Believe me, I know. Andrew was so ecstatic over this success that I am now assigned to three weeks of only speaking with sentences from War and Peace. Wish me luck, because three weeks is a long time.