This is one of those posts that I really wanted to write when it was fresh and happening. Unfortunately the apparent necessity to push math to the forefront took precedence. So now, late, here it is.

My first day wasn’t quite as weird as I thought it would be. I got dressed, I got my backpack, and I walked to school. Once I sat down and class started, you forget that you’re a 31 year old freshman going back to school; it’s just class.

I showed up to class about 15 minutes early to insure that I got a seat towards the front of class which I prefer. Over the next 15 minutes the class got filled and people kept coming. They were directed to an overflow room that enabled them to watch the class over a live video feed and be seen on a monitor only the professor could see (though the entire class could hear). It’s a 2-hour class with a 10 minute break halfway through. During break I took a quick inventory of the class. Without counting exact numbers I would say there was more than a half-dozen girls in the class. A very respectable number for an engineering class which is a male-dominated field (with electrical engineering providing an even rarer glimpse).

Also during break I had my first exchange of pleasantries with a classmate. Anjun is a freshman student who’s come to America from China to become an electrical engineer. We talked a bit and I shared a little insight and told him to ignore one of the other classmates who earlier claimed that the class was “extremely hard” and this was his 2nd time taking it because the last time he got a D.

Monday’s class is Digital Design and is a fantastic way for me to start school. I expect that I will know 95-98% of all of the subject matter of this class, so it’s a nice way to get “in the groove” of school without stressing out too much about subject matter.

Class is from 10:00 to noon and after class Monday I decided to hang out at campus and grab a bite to eat. Eating outside with all of my college mates I was greeted with a show that was quite the stereotypical college-campus event. Standing on a little outdoor stage was a young man claiming to be a messianic Jew for Jesus who informed us that we were all going to hell if we didn’t acknowledge the Torah and Jesus. He then proceeded to say mean things about a great many people. This is when things took on a Portland flavor. A bum had walked onto campus (which is tightly integrated into the city) and began a yelling match with our Mr. Sermon. It was honestly enjoyable to watch and the crowd did it’s part with the expected heckling.

Now, I’m officially in college.

Tuesday is my Physics day, and day one was interesting. The professor, Dr. Abramson, warned us multiple times during our first two hours together that Physics is challenging and we should not take it lightly. Again and again. Now here I am, sitting in the third row, listening with more than a little anxiety. This is the class I’ve been worried about, and he wasn’t helping.

That evening was the third of my three classes, Physics Lab. I met a 2nd student there, Eric, who is now my lab partner. I was hoping to land this one cute girl as a lab partner, but Eric sat down next to me and that was that. Eric’s an “older” student going back to school as well. Though he’s 23 and halfway towards a degree, so we’re not in quite the same boat. He is also a Portland transplant though and as new to the city as I am. We’ve exchanged phone numbers and will likely go grab a beer one night.

Wednesday: Digital Design. Show up to class, feel pretty smart, pat myself on the back. The only thing to really note is after class I spent almost an hour in the hallway talking with Anjun about engineering and trying to give him a better feel about the differences between several engineering fields. We exchanged email addresses and said goodbye.

Thursday. I went into physics class ready to learn. I was learning, learning, learning, and then I was falling, falling, falling. By the end of class my eyes were glazed over and I realized that if I’m going to get through physics I’m going to need to catch up on my math… badly. What followed has already been written about so let’s not rehash.

That was my week. I’m not so sure that I feel like a “college kid” yet, or if I ever fully will. But I definitely felt like a student by the end of week 1. I’ve got studying to do, and homework, and notes to take. I’m sincerely worried about my physics class, but also recognize that I’m taking the first steps of a long journey and there will be ample room to improve missteps taken early on.

This week things have been going better.

After my digital class on Monday Anjun was getting a bit lost. So I offered to head to the library with him and cover some of the material with him. A fellow classmate heard us, introduced himself as Chad, and asked to join in. So the three of us spent some time at the library and I got a chance to pretend to be a tutor.

Physics class this morning also went smoother. We’re moving forward and covering some more science-y stuff and less calculus, so I was able to follow along. I’ve caught up with just enough trigonometry in the past week to be OK when we discussed vectors today. It feels so good to understand what’s being taught and be able to follow along. I noticed and appreciated it today.

Physics lab, this evening was also better. Eric and I worked a lab with Katie and Mishael. It got boisterous and fun. The TA who leads the lab, Xiaohua, also joined in our fun a little bit. Xiaohua is a physics grad student who, judging by her accent, is fairly new to America. We got in a conversation about Google and it’s ability to solve math problems, with Xiaohua saying she used Google instead of a calculator now. I replied with, “Yeah, Google is impressive. The other day I couldn’t find my keys so I googled ‘Where the hell are my keys?’ and they replied with ‘Under your bed.’ Sure enough there were my keys!”

Xiaohua looked slightly puzzled and asked in the most earnest tone, “How did they know your keys were under the bed?” Laughing I explained that it was a joke and then she joined in the laughter, laughing as much at herself as anything else.

The lab is much more active and you work in groups and you get to meet people. It definitely plays to my social side as I got to work not only with my group of 4, but chat a little with neighboring students as well.

So that’s been my first week and half. Physics will continue to be a challenge and math will continue to be my “fourth and fifth” class as I struggle to catch up before I get left behind. However it goes, it’ll go and I’ll go right along with it.

I’m going to school. I’m doing homework. I’m meeting new people. Good, good times.

seppuku

n.
Ritual suicide by disembowelment formerly practiced by Japanese samurai. Also called hara-kiri.

Source: thefreedictionary.com

“Are you sure you want to take physics with calculus even though it’s been so long since you took calculus?” she asked. I remember feeling a just a tinge of worry when the general adviser at PSU posed this question back on orientation day.

“Yeah, I think I’ll be fine.” I replied, though I was less sure than my tone implied. I’m much, much, much less sure now. As I learn physics I’m forced to scramble to learn calculus. I think if I merely had to catch up on calculus I’d be OK. But my algebra isn’t simply a bit rusty. It’s not even rusted in place. My algebra has rusted away and there are just some rusty, jagged edges in my brain where math once sat.

I’ve spent over an hour trying to remember how to simplify fractions. Worse yet, I’m not even sure I should be trying to simplify a fraction.

I purchased, and have been reading a “crash course” in calculus. Some of it yields “oh yeah!” moments, and sometimes I actually get the sample problems correct. These are moments of hope. Then I get a question like this:

Differentiate:

So I start working my way through the proof. Only I really don’t get very far. In fact, I really only get to the first step which is simply writing the basic formula for :

Now so far I have done absolutely nothing. No math has yet been done. So I stare at this. I tell myself that I should be taking things out of denominators. Not because I know this to be the right thing to do, but because I have no clue what else to do. I know what my final answer is supposed to be (the book gives it to me) so I start moving forward in any direction I can.

Only I don’t move forward. I simply don’t remember this stuff. I can still execute Sub-Zero’s fatality, I remember that Liono’s weird pet-thing was named Snarf, and I can sing an all-too-large portion of the intro theme to Disney’s Gummi Bears, all of those things are maintained in the archives. But wasteful stuff like algebra, trigonometry, and calculus? Ha! We jettisoned that nonsense as soon as we could.

So after staring blankly and doing some simulated problems with using only numbers (and no variables) I realized that I wasn’t going to get there on my own. So I hit up the internet. I read probably half a dozen websites and a couple of .PDF files. Eventually I learn of the “quotient rule” as something I may be interested in right now. I found an example of it hosted on, where-else, Wikipedia.

I’m just now learning how to use the LaTeX math functions. Imagine how happy I was writing this post when I found out there’s a WordPress plugin that allows me to use these new skills to display fancy formulas.

I don’t know the exact amount of time I’ve spent on this one problem, but I think it was about 1 1/2 hours. At 11:30 pm I found the info on Wikipedia. It’s now past midnight as I share this story with you.

These past 3 days have been pretty frustrating. I’m finding however, that my frustration comes in two flavors. One flavor is actually an empowering sort of frustration. I hear the little numbers laugh at me, sometimes they even try to spit on me. But I remind myself that so far there has been nothing put before me that I haven’t known at some point in the past. I convince myself that I can and will relearn that which I have forgotten. I tell myself that I will crush those cocky little numbers and teach them the humility they so deserve. This is a frustration that brings out the “fight” side of my fight-or-flight mode. I like it. I love it. You can’t break me numbers!

Then there’s the other flavor.

The other flavor of frustration comes as a tension in my neck. It tires me and makes me want to drop physics tomorrow. It is the devil on my shoulders reminding me that if I drop physics I’ll have months of time to catch up on my math.

Luckily the former frustration has been prevalent much more often than the latter. Though it has only been one week.

Well… no one said this would be easy. If I wanted easy I’d be in Texas right now with my biggest concern being whether or not my timesheet was up to date.

The fight continues…

2009-10-04 @ 9:30 AM – Update: The quotient rule was indeed what I was looking for. How I forgot is beyond me.