{Desperata} an urgent missive

I knew it was too good to last. At present I share the sentiments of the fox who, after escaping from one horrible trap, falls in another ten feet distant that the crafty hunter thought to set for him. The pain of the injury is not the worst part. Nay, it is far out-shined by the sensation of humiliation in having to face this foe again.

Of what do I speak, my friends?

Let me wind you a tale of woe which, as the poet says, "holdeth the children from play and the old men from the fireside."

I am thought of by many as a clever woman...handy with words and fluent in literature. A woman of refined tastes who enjoys music, art, theatre, language, people, and many another genteel thing. I am thought to hold certain old-fashioned sentiments as relates to the countryside, romance, and dreams. I am known as a woman who loves travel and history, sophistication and the cosmopolitan side of life. I am thought of in this light and there is a deal of truth and reality in it. But what no one could ever accuse me of is the bare idea of being clever on the practical side of the brain. No one would think to accuse me of it because the possibility is laughable.

Logic, while shining as a beacon I could never attain, is not my forte.

I am lost when discussing strategy.

Debate and social studies, economics and many another thing are equally out of my grasp.

But nothing towers over these looming Unattainables like that nefarious creature, Mathematics. Oh how many years I was a slave to him, breaking to his will because I could not bend to it. Serving him at arm's length and tossing my pencil aside as soon as the last flourish of the final answer was finished. He was not much pleased with my service, for I was more often than not erroneous in my computations. But as every educated human must, I served this master for twelve years--yea, and beyond!

 The day of my graduation was a day of rejoicing among the nations. Even in that foreign camp of Arithmetic there was a measure of jubilation, for even my difficult master could not help but be relieved at the loss of such a pupil.

I lived for one short, giddy year of bliss under the delusion that I'd marry a good man, a clever man, who could teach arithmetic to my children. He would fill in where I could not. That I was, in short, finished with Mathematics for good and could spend the remainder of my days devoting my mental capacity to my chosen and beloved creative pursuits. But I erased from my memory a dark cloud suggestive of another meeting with my task-master. Surely, thought I, we shall avoid each others presence forevermore. What more can he want from me? I have paid my dues.
But it was not to be. My master had grown fond of me in his cruel fashion and demanded an interview. My courage quailed under what he proposed, wavered, and fell to his cold, flint-edged will, persuaded by my mother that it would be Good For Me.

A moment of weakness, though with my mother pressing on one side and my father {a sworn friend of Mathematics and Practicality} on the other, I had little choice in the matter. Even the companion of my bedroom, my dear sister, has defected to the side of Mathematics. She is predisposed to find his lessons easy, if not pleasant. He masquerades this band of villainy under the title "Stewardship Math"....I can only cross my arms and glare at this sad turn of events and hope my slavery will not smack of Algebraic equations.

This is the end of the long, sad tale. I have given my hand to Mathematics for a brief course in which he shall have his way with me. His capricious, practical, terrible way. There is nothing for it. He has convinced Mama that there are certain blanks in my education that only a rendezvous can fill. He has already entrenched my father in on his side. I am a doomed creature.

It is a relief that I do not believe in omens. Did I-- and were my mother right in saying perhaps I shall need my master's lessons in days to come--the prophesy for my marriage is not bright. For it appears that if I am in need of these further lessons as taught by Mathematics, my husband will be, among other things, a mawkish dolt who thinks of and delights in nothing but profit and loss, interest rates and credit cards, sporting scores and home repairs.

Heaven save me from such a fate if such things be true!

            With trembling fingers I sign this missive,

                                                                Desperata

(known to most of my acquaintance as Rachel: an unfortunate female of the non-logician variety)