From Omar's notebook.
This is a story about my good friend Caleb. It happened a few years ago, in our senior year at St. Olaf College. Northfield, MN.
Every year the math department held a little talent show. There was ice cream, snacks, and a surprising number of juggling professors. Most did a musical performance. I remember the host, professor Olaf, telling jokes in limerick form before introducing each act.
After all the people who had signed up were done, professor Olaf asked if there were any last minute acts. Did anyone have a hidden talent they felt inspired to share?
I said I could! I got up and did a handstand (my leftover talent from my gymnastics days). I could walk forwards, backwards, and talk all throughout. This is often a surprise to people because I don't look like the type who can do a handstand, and I never talk about my gymnastics past.
In the meantime, I would later learn, I was stalling just long enough for a song to finish brewing in Caleb's head.
After I'm done, Professor Olaf asks again — any last minute acts?
Caleb volunteers to close out the night. He gets up on stage, sits at the piano, and says that he's going to share with us something special. It's a lullaby that his mom, a mathematician, used to sing to him. And her mom used to sing to her when she was young, and so on down a long line of mathematicians.
And he starts to play to the tune of (TODO: what was the tune of the song?):
Well I love math
You don’t even have to ask
Just put a square root in front of me and then you’ll see
How much I love math
You don’t even have to ask
Just put a square root in front of me and then you’ll see
Take a number like 16
A number pure and true
And wrap a root around it
Whose argument is 2
The output, pure as input
Is a number I adore
It’s 2 plus 2, it’s 1 plus 3
Root 16 is, of course, 4
Well I love math
You don’t even have to ask
Just put a square root in front of me and then you’ll see
You might think that there’s a goal
That there are more square roots to do
After all we’re on a roll
Root 16 is 4, root 4 is 2
As it turns out, the end is near
Root 2 isn’t exactly fractional
It’s long and winding, hard to know
In fact it’s quite irrational
(ONE MORE TIME!)
Well I love math
You don’t even have to ask
Just put a square root in front of me and then you’ll see
The performance was just enchanting. Everyone was wondering: was this story really true? Did he just make all that up? Who was this guy anyway? No one had ever really seen Caleb around the math department much, he was only there that night because I dragged him.
Even knowing Caleb I was still in shock. There's no way he prepared for this, because we decided to go to this event very last minute. He performed it so confidently. He had the audience singing along. He'd pause on lines like "Root 16 is of course..." and wait for the audience to shout "4".
I remember talking to my professor the next day, who was asking me if I knew this man, and if I could shed light on this enigma that had all the professors wondering. "Surely this wasn't the first time he performed that?" he asked.
The truth was Caleb did just make up with the whole thing minutes before getting up on stage. He started thinking the moment Professor Olaf asked for last minute acts. He said he wasn't even done with the whole thing when he had to get up. He just started playing and trusted an ending would come to him.
I find myself thinking about this moment a lot. About the sheer amount of courage it takes to volunteer with a half written song you've never performed before. About the faith you must have in your abilities. About the confidence it takes to look so relaxed acting as if this is a song you've heard all your life.
I want to say thank you to Caleb for bringing this moment of magic to all of us on that night, and for leaving me with this lingering memory.