The Cinderella Theorem
Read The Cinderella Theorem Online
Authors: Kristee Ravan
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places,
and events either are products of the author’s imagination or are used
fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locations, or persons, living
or dead, is entirely coincidental.
The math in this book is entirely non-fictional. It
is based on actual math that really does exist and is awesome. If you haven’t
already done so today, please take a moment to thank your math teacher for
being a perpetuator of said awesomeness.
Text copyright©2014 Kristee Ravan
All Rights Reserved
For Kellee, who loves Cinderella,
For Lisa, who loves math,
And for Jason, who loves me
If you want your children to be intelligent, read them
fairy tales. If you want them to be more intelligent, read them more fairy
tales.
-
Albert Einstein
Pretzels and The Box
“Lily,”
Mrs. Price, my guidance counselor, flashed a fake smile. “You seemed to have
forgotten to put any fun in your schedule. Why don’t I switch you out of
Geometry and put you in Health and Careers? Lots of students say this is a
fun
class…” She let that last part dangle in the air, like a worm on a hook.
I
don’t like worms on hooks. “No thanks.”
Mrs.
Price shifted in her seat, still smiling. “And this class helps you discover
what you’re good at and lets you explore your career options.”
Chatting
with a woman who can’t recite the Pythagorean Theorem isn’t exactly how I
thought I would be spending my first day of high school. “I know what I want my
career to be.”
Mrs.
Price sat up straighter, leaning forward. “Oh, and what is that?”
“I
want to do pure mathematics research at a major university or be a code breaker
for the National Security Agency.”
Her
eyebrows arched. I think she thought I was going to say
I want to be a
doctor when I grow up
or
I want to be an artist
.
“Lily,” Mrs. Price said slowly,
“Are your parents pressuring you to take more math classes?”
“No.”
I folded my arms across my chest. Mrs. Price has incorrectly assigned
two
parents to me. This can lead to an error in the equation of my family.
1 Lily + 1 mother = the Sparrow family.
The Sparrow family ≠ 1 Lily + 1 mother + 1
father.
[1]
“Lily,
if you don’t want to take these extra math classes, you don’t have to. Your
parents can’t make you.”
“I
want to take Geometry.”
“Lily,”
Mrs. Price paused dramatically. “Do you know that you can talk to me about anything?”
Is
that supposed to make me open up to her? Mrs. Price has not equalized her
equation. She assumes: one simple reminder of being able to talk to her = me
sharing my deepest beliefs and ideas.
I
sighed. “Mrs. Price, no one is pressuring me to take math classes. I just like
math, that’s all.”
Mrs.
Price frowned. “I had hoped you would agree with me, Lily, and change your mind
about these classes, because I’m afraid I can’t allow you to jeopardize your
academic career with difficult classes that will cause you extra stress. Besides,
our school district frowns upon students taking more than one math course a
year. I’m going to switch you from Geometry to Health and Careers, from
Statistics to Tennis, and from Pre-Calculus to Legendary Literature. This will
be a much less stressful class load for you.”
It
was my turn to frown. Scowl, actually. “How exactly are Health and Careers,
Tennis, and
Legendary
Literature going to help me in life?” I was
especially disgusted with Legendary Literature. Tennis was at least active and
I suppose Health and Careers would–
at the very least
–be informative.
“Lily,
I’m sure you’ll enjoy these classes. Other students in this school have rated
these electives as some of their favorites. Now, run on back to class.” She returned
my schedule card, all marked up and practically math free.
Can
I have a look at population and sample data used to arrive at this conclusion? Other
students in this school do not want to be mathematics
researchers.
Other
students in this school do not understand that mathematics is fundamental to
all life. Other students in this school do not
love
math. I
do
.
Mrs. Price called cheerily, “Oh,
I almost forgot. Happy birthday, Lily!”
Yeah, what a great start to my
birthday. Resigned to my mathless fate, I walked back to class figuring out how
many days were left until I graduated and escaped to college.
4 years x the 180 days required
by the state = 720 days – the ½ a morning I wasted arguing with Mrs. Price
about the joy of mathematics = 719 ¾ days.
[2]
~~~
My mother is a famous writer (in
this equation, famous = distracted). For some reason, that I have not been able
to calculate, being a famous writer makes it difficult to focus on any one
thing for extended periods of time, including daughters’ birthdays. Writing is
not as exact as math.
To combat her distraction, I mark
my birthday on every calendar in the house. It’s not so much that Mom forgets
my birthday. It’s that she gets distracted while planning. This year, I took an
additional precaution: I changed her screen saver to “LILY’S BIRTHDAY IS
THURSDAY!!!!!”
So, having solved the problem of
the distractedness, we are usually ready to proceed with normal birthday
celebrations. I say
usually
because there are occasionally book signings
or tours that cause further issues. This year, however, there were none of
these kinds of complications.
That is not to say that there were
no
complications.
There was, in fact, a huge one.
I came home from school intending to go out to dinner
with my mother. That is a normal, mathematical way to celebrate a birthday. I
grabbed a handful of pretzels from a bowl on the counter and popped my head
into Mom’s office to say hello. (Mom’s office = a cluttered, messy room full of
unorganized paper scraps that contain notes about her stories.)
Mom smiled at me. “How was school?”
“Not enough math.” I munched a pretzel. “What time are
we going out tonight?”
“Going out?” Mom’s voice was quieter, distracted. She
was sinking back into her novel.
“For dinner? For my birthday?”
Eyes fixed on her computer screen, she answered, “No. Matt
is bringing dinner.”
“Matt? Matt who?” I quickly ran a mental index of my
mother’s friends, acquaintances, and contacts for a Matt.
Mom gasped, covered her mouth with her hand, and
mumbled, “Oh! It was supposed to be a surprise! What am I—”
“Mom!” I grabbed her shoulders, crushing a pretzel in
my palm. “Stop. Who is Matt? Explain logically.”
She nodded. “Okay. Let’s sit down.” She led the way to
the living room, and sat beside me on the couch, patting me on the back. “The
thing is, Lily, I don’t want to explain too much without your father. He—”
“Wait. What?” I interrupted. “My
father
?”
“Oh! Fiddlesticks! I did it again! Matt’s going to
kill me. I do fine for fifteen years and blow it on the last day. Why am I—”
“Mom!”
“Right. Well,” she took a breath. “To begin, I should
say that your father is not dead.”
“But, he is dead. You told me that he died–that the
train he was on hit a cow.”
[3]
“No, Sweetie.” She patted my knee. “He’s not dead. He
is alive and he’s coming to dinner.”
“I don’t understand. The train wrecked, the cow died, Dad
died. You showed me the news story.”
Mom sighed. (Why is she sighing? Did she think that I
would automatically understand? Did I miss the
Lily, your dad is not dead
memo?) “There was a train wreck, a cow did die. And it was on the news. But
your father was
not
on the train.”
I took a deep breath. “Okay. Where was he?”
“He wants to explain all this to you, and he should be
the one to do it. Can we just leave it at: he’s not dead, and he’s coming to
dinner tonight?”
“Why
did you tell me he was dead?”
“It
was safer for everyone if you thought that. But, Lily, your father can explain
this a lot better than me.” She stood up. “Now, I need to work on getting the
prince to fall in love with the princess, and you should probably get your
homework done before dinner. I’m sure you’re going to have a lot to talk about
with your dad.” She turned to go back to the office.
Are
you kidding me?
That’s
the end of the conversation?
~~~
Mom
was wrong to assume I had homework. It was the first day of school. We wasted
most of the day with passing out textbooks and going over rules. I spent my homework
time analyzing the events of the afternoon. Specifically, I tried to place Mom’s
shocking new variables into the equation of Lily’s Life.
Lily = a 5 foot, normal, freshman girl, who has shoulder
length
blonde hair, green eyes, and a distracted mother.
The
new variables that now need to be put into my equation are
A = my father is
alive
and
B = my mother is a liar
.
A
and B are dependent upon one another. For instance, my mother is proved to be a
liar (B), because my father is alive (A). My father’s being alive (A) was a
secret because my mother is a liar (B).
How
is that normal?
Statistically
speaking, teenagers should have parents who create supportive environments for
them to grow in during their difficult, formative years. This is the
mathematically
proven way of success.
[4]
How
are a dead father, who is not dead, and a mother, who is a liar, supportive? What
teenager sits around on her fifteenth birthday trying to think of questions to
ask her mother about her used-to-be-dead father?
I
was led to believe my father died in a bizarre train/cow accident two days
before I was born. I always thought of it like this:
After the accident = (Amtrak
– 1 train) + (Lily – 1 father) + (Farmer Jones – 1 cow)
But none
of this matters now, since my father is
not
actually dead. How unfortunate
there isn’t enough time in the Plan of Lily’s Life to have therapy discussing
cows, liars, and fathers.
I dug
around in the bottom of my closet looking for
The Box
my mother gave me for
my fifth birthday. It contains everything I know about my father and once upon
a time, I thought it was the best birthday present ever.
[5]
When I was younger, I kept
The Box
beside my bed. I was very afraid of
the dark as a child and having
The Box
next to me gave irrational
comfort. (Mom leaving the hall light on helped, too.) But as I grew older and
no longer needed
The Box
beside me to sleep, I put it away in my closet,
getting it out less and less to look at the items and think about my father. And
this past year, I hadn’t even looked at
The Box
since my last birthday.
I
blew the dust off, slowly opening the lid to hear the creak of the hinges. I
like that sound.
The Box
has a tarnished keyhole, but the key was lost
before I ever had it. I ran my fingers over the lid, feeling the words carved on
the smooth wooden surface: