| Sunny Side Up! November 14, 2001 � 2001, Kathleen Gibson A number too important to fib about �Here, read this.� I handed a recent manuscript to my daughter. Ever since she learned that C is for Cat, Amanda has been reading my writing. I value her opinion. She doesn�t let her love for me get in the way of the truth. She read a moment. Stopped. Her finger tapped a line of print �One. Two. Three. Four. She tapped faster. �OneTwoThreeFour. There�s only four things here. You said five.� I groaned. �Oh honey, please tell me I didn�t send that one off already.� She sighed, then chuckled. She knows my secret, you see. I am a numeric paranoic: I hate numbers in any form�avoid them like dieters avoid all foods creamy, sweet, or slippery. �Never trust me if I quote you a number,� I tell my friends. There are ways of circumventing this quirk in my cognitive preference. Writing the numbers down helps (usually), and when necessary my other senses willingly pick up the slack. I rarely measure anything conventionally. I use my fingers, my hands, my forearms. I�ve even lain full length and used my body as a measuring stick. Hip to knee long, I say. A forearm and half a thumb. Five hand widths. I�ve passed examinations in geometry, algebra, trigonometry, and calculus. I�ve successfully counted votes at municipal, provincial, and federal elections. I keep my bank account in order. I can face numbers if I must, but when given the option, I cheerfully detour around them. Nevertheless, some numbers stick like burrs, even to my Teflon brain. My address. My phone number. My SIN number: a bag of licorice is 329, I have 002 children, and I have tea at 930 (not exactly, but you get the idea). And I admit there are a few numbers I�m actually fond of�the house number of my childhood home, the year I married, and one number that increases yearly. It�s forty-five now. Someone recently�hesitantly�asked how old I was. They were surprised when I answered. I never lie about my age, you see. I quite like it. It�s not honor alone that keeps me telling the truth. It�s mainly that I�ve never been able to decide which year in all those forty-five I would leave out if I fibbed. Certainly none of my childhood years, nor those heady college years, when I felt the whole world was mine. And though in my years of marriage and parenting there have been moments I�d rather forget, I would be loathe to delete a whole year. For nearly half a century, I�ve been under construction. My years are the frame on which my life has been built. I am who I am today because of the time God has granted me to get here; time that�s counted in numbers of days, weeks, months and years. I�ve earned the right to tell my age, and tell it honestly. I am grateful for each day of it. Even if it is a number. You can respond to this column at [email protected] |