PLANE GEOMETRY, SPUTNIK, AND I

PLANE GEOMETRY, SPUTNIK, AND I

In our development, we recapitulate 

the issue of our times.

Unknown

     In a recent writing group, the facilitator assigned the task of writing about the influence of broader collective trends on our individual development.  When she talked about the assignment, one word leapt to my mind—Sputnik. In thinking about this topic, however, I had to enlarge her instructions to include a significant personal influence that opened the door to a larger collective one.
First, the personal influence.  When I was an adolescent I was particularly susceptible to authority.  One person who embodied authority for me was my high school plane geometry teacher, Miss Story.  On the first day of class, Miss Story explained that plane geometry was a subject that would teach itself to you; all you had to do was wait for it to show you the way.  For me, an extremely near-sighted, introverted, and troubled teen, her words might as well have been written on stone tablets on Mount Sinai.  Plane geometry taught itself to me, and I excelled at it.
The next year the Soviets launched the first Sputnik satellite, an achievement that stunned the world.  Few could imagine how the United States had fallen so far behind in technology.  A rallying cry went up across the land:  Grab all the young people you can find who are good at science and math and train them.
My personal world and the larger world intersected at that time.  Never mind that my interests lay in literature.  Never mind that higher forms of math failed to teach themselves to me.   In fact, never mind ANYTHING else; the larger interests must be served.   It was decades before I learned--painfully and often at odds with collective values like money and position--that what is important is the direction and flow of my little life force, that only in them are larger interests truly served.
Events of the late 50’s and early 60’s contorted me into a misshapen young adult.  Influential figures, both in my little world of high school and in college delivered the same message:  It doesn’t matter what is important to you.  And lacking personal authority, I colluded with them.
In looking back on these events decades later, I can see that new, powerful currents were set in motion then that were at odds with long-standing cultural values.  Young girls were supposed to marry, achieve marital bliss, have children, and keep a good house.  How could I excel in math and science AND do all that too?  Oh, the confusion of it all, the utterly impossible demands.  Some how I muddled through, perhaps am even better off for having done so.
I can see clearly now that the current cultural message to young women is as stupidly unnatural and unlivable as it was 50 years ago.  Today’s demand on young women?  You can still do it all.
There is a lot to be said for growing old.