Another reason why English class beats Calculus.

I sometimes marvel that God chose to risk his revelation in the ambiguities of language. If he had wanted to make sure that the truth was absolutely clear, without any possibility of misunderstanding, he should have revealed his truth by means of mathematics. Mathematics is the most precise, unambiguous language that we have. But then, of course, you can’t say ‘I love you’ in algebra. --Eugene Peterson, Eat This Book

Me and math. We’re not friends.

I said my farewell as soon as I completed my final required course during the spring of my senior year of high school. I left that sorry sucker in the hallways behind as soon as my tassel was turned and didn’t look back.

I’ve had my share of ambivalent teachers over the years.* Added to that is the fact that I had/have an in-dwelling dislike for the formulas, the angles, the precision of a subject matter that has, for the most part, seemed rather impertinent to life I lead.

This week here at Penland has brought me to the stark realization that...I was wrong. Granted, I don’t believe I’ll ever hold a job where I’m required to recall the complexities of calculus. But, in the art of letterpress, there is a definite need for the geometry I’ve buried in the recesses of my mind. There is, indeed, real life application for exact line and angle measurements.

And quite frankly, I’ve forgotten how to be that accurate.

For years now, I’ve put my money in the bank of the English language. I was going to be a writer. Math smath. Who needs it?

Well, through a series of events and a little divergence from plan A, turns out I do. What I’m doing now requires the ability to slow and measure -- to get it right the first time. Because, there is a right answer. If a line of type is set into the bed of a press one pica from where it should be, it’ll throw an entire composition off when printed. If the ink rollers are set 1/8 inch too low, they can crush an alphabet of antique wooden type with one crank of the press.

So, this week, I’ve come up against my inadequacies and my need to reach back and remember. I pray that I will come away from this experience with a little more attention to the math that matters.

That said, I still hold tightly to the phantom power and mystery of our language. My belief in it is still the underlying reason thAT I’m here. My reading of ETB has impressed me again with a reverence for the intricacies of a system of letters and words that with which we’ve been given to speak, to write, to try and understand each other.

It is an untamable force. It’s endlessly perplexing.

And why God chose the written word to reign in His truth, I do not know. While it’s imperfect, it’s the best we have. If He had chosen to communicate through numbers, we might have a perfectly flat understanding, but without the enchantment.

We’d have an academic knowledge, but know not the poetry of His love.

*One particular instructor was so terrible, that her behaviors caused me to write her name into the quadratic formula in a not-so-nice fashion. I believe the particular doodle on the side of my notes said something to the effect of: the square root of -(attitude) +/- the square root of {(Mrs. X^2-(4*absolute cruelty)}/ 2(awful) = meaniehead. Yes, I was in eleventh grade. Imagine my embarrassment when I went in for some after school tutoring and forgot to erase my little formulaic insult.