Mother's Chronicles (Book 1)

11

Maps & Maths

"My hands long to play."

Not only to play the organ, but also to paint, to draw, to. . . .

Everything, therefore, went on together: music, painting, games, studies.

Mirra, we saw, began to learn her alphabet a bit . . . late; at age seven. But once begun there was no holding her back. She easily outstripped all the children her own age. All that she needed was 'to understand,' as she reiterated to Satprem.

"But I recall, you see, I perfectly recall my own attitude when I was learning. I also clearly remember all my schoolmates: who for me was a girl with brains, who was a wordmill. ... I have some entertaining memories about that, for I couldn't understand

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the meaning of learning for the sake of having a knowing air I had a tremendous memory at that lime, but 1 ucvci made use of it. And i liked only what 1 understood."

Then Mother tailed to mind some 'entertaining memories.'

For a time 1 attended a private school. I never went to public school because my mother considered n unfitting lot a girl to be in a public school. But 1 attended a private school that had a great reputation at the time; they had as teachers really highly com mendable men. The geography teacher, a reputed man, had written books (his books on geography were well-known) and was a very line man. So then we were doing geography 1 enjoyed enormously doing maps because they had to be drawn. One day, the teacher looked at me (he was an intelligent man), he looked at me. He asked me, 'Why are towns, the big cities, situated on river banks?' 1 saw the faces of the-students flabbergasted- saying to themselves: Lucky! The question wasn't put to me\ 1 answered: But it's very simple! Because that's a natural way of

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communication!'" Mother laughed, "He too was taken aback."

Mirra enjoyed herself thoroughly.

"That's how it was, all my studies were like that, the whole time 1 enjoyed myself enjoyed-enjoyed-enjoyed —it was all enjoyable."

Not only did she startle her teachers with her answers, she also scared some of them.

"My teacher of literature was an old fellow full of all the most conventional ideas imaginable. What a bore he was, ugh! So all the students sat there, their noses to the grindstone. He gave subjects for composition. Do you know The Path of Later On and the Road of Tomorrow?* I wrote it when 1 was twelve; it was my test paper to the question he had set the class to do. He had given a proverb (1 don't remember the exact words) and he expected to be told ... all the sensible things! 1 told my story, that little story (written at the age of twelve). He eyed me with misgivings." Mother laughed mischievously, "He expected me to

* Le sender de tout-á-l'heure et la route de demain.

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make a scandal. . . . No, I was a good girl, don't you know!"

Her enjoyment remained unabated even during examinations. "Only once in my life 1 sat for an exam (I forget which one). But 1 was just at the age limit, I mean, at the time of the regular examination 1 was under age, so they sat me with those who had failed in the first exam (I sat at that time because it was in autumn when I was just the right age). Well, 1 remember that we were a small company; the teachers were greatly annoyed because their holidays had been cut short in the middle, and the students for the most part were pretty mediocre or else rebellious. So then 1 was observing all that (1 was very young, you see, the -teen or fourteen, I don't know), I was observing all that. A poor little thing had been called to the blackboard to do a mathematical problem she didn't know how to do it, she was faltering. 1 looked 1 wasn't being questioned just then 1 looked and 1 smiled. Oh dear me! The teacher saw it. lie was quite displeased with me. As soon as the girl went back to her place, he called me. lie told me, 'You do it.' Well

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naturally (1 loved mathematics very much, really very much; besides 1 understood it, it spoke to me), 1 did the problem. . . . The chap's face!"

Mirra's own face gave her an air of seriousness. But "1 had the most extraordinary fun."

*

* *

Yes, Mirra "loved mathematics very much, really very much." After all, was she not the daughter of a mathematical wizard? "Besides, 1 Understood it, it spoke to me." Mother explained, "Everything would become like a picture, you see. . . ."

Mother recounted to us: "At home, my hi other was doing advanced mathematics, for his entrance to the Polytechnique, and he found it difficult. So my mother had engaged a tutor to coach him. I was two years younger than my brother. 1 used to look on, and then everything would become clear: the why, the how, everything was clear. So, the tutor was working hard, my brother was working haul, when 1 blurted out, But it's like this! 1 hen 1 saw the tutor's

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expression! ... It seems he went and told my mother, It is rather your daughter who ought to study this!' It was all such fun, such fun!"

This love for mathematics never left Mother, I think.

Way back in the forties, there was a very young boy, always up to some mischief. He was eight or ten, I don't exactly know. Anyway he was so small that his feet did not reach the pedals if he sat on the saddle of his father's bicycle. So the little fellow would stand on the pedals, swing his body from side to side and pedal away for all he was worth. If he fell down, well, what of it? He got up, dusted himself or not, and went on with his pedalling act. Now, one day he wandered into a place where he was not supposed to go. A building had just been constructed, but the garden was not yet laid out, the grounds were still in a litter. There was an open well in the compound. So the boy went wandering around, and when nobody was looking his way, he went to the well, bent over to have a very good view, lost his balance, and promptly fell inside. Very soon he was fished out. But how scared he was, oh!

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Not because he had fallen in the well and was almost drowned —he couldn't swim then —but because his family insisted that he go and tell Mother of his misadventure himself. He wept and wept but was finally persuaded to go and tell Mother. Mother is Mother. She wiped away his tears, soothed his troubled heart, saying that she was his friend so he should never feel afraid of her but come and tell her at once if anything troubled him. When he was quite consoled, Mother asked him what he liked doing. Surprisingly he said, "Sums." Mother was delighted and told him that she herself was very fond of maths and, when young, was very good at it. And would he like to learn it from her? Imagine the boy's joy. Mother herself teaching him to do sums! Did not all his elders stand in awe of her? His parents, his sisters, and others as well, were all dumbfounded at this turn of events. Naturally.

Thus, the bright little boy had his grounding in mathematics, and, let us hope, had as much fun as little Mirra.

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