It’s been such a long time since I went to school – any school – that I don’t even get the urge to go back to school anymore. I always liked school, almost as much as Son who burst into tears the other day when Grandma tried to high-five him, saying, “no school tomorrow!”

I liked school, I liked most of my teachers, and I’d like to think that I learned something during all those years. Well, I know I learned a lot but I also know that I’ve probably forgot most of it. It’s like going back to the gym after a break. I always put the same weights as always, “because I could benchpress that much last time.”

Somewhere in the back of my mind, probably occupying the same exact space in my brain that the actual knowledge used to be, there is now just knowledge of past knowledge.

My biology teacher knew what she was talking about when she told my class just a few weeks before our graduation that we should enjoy that time, because … “You will never know as much about as many things as now.”

I know I used to be able to solve pretty advanced mathematical problems. After all, I did graduate from a, ahem, Finnish high school – a product of the world famous Finnish educational system! – with an A in advanced math but these days I get frustrated when I can’t figure out the gas consumption of our Volvo in my head while driving 2000 kilometers to Legoland and back.

A few weeks ago I was trying to help Wife solve a problem that involved three variables and too little info, I thought. I can still handle Son’s second-grade math so I haven’t regressed all the way to the beginning, but apparently, high school math isn’t a similar walk in the park as I’d like to think it used to be.

But I will never give up, so I sat at the living room table with papers flying and pen smoking, sweat pouring down my face all the more with every crumbled ball of paper I threw across the table.

“Seven!” I said, or shouted. “It’s seven!”

“You sure?” Wife asked.

“Well, see, if a equals 28 and y is 4, and then … minus this, multiplied with, and then both sides times 6… “ I said before Wife interrupted me.

“You want me to check the right answer at the back of the book?” she asked me.

“No! Yes. No. Do you?” I said.

My high school physics teacher was a big man, a very big man. Masa was a former hammer thrower, which was a great fit, because my high school was a sports school, with several elite athletes in different sports. But the physics teacher had retired some time ago by the time I met him and he already had the body of a former hammer thrower. He was a gentle man, a really nice man, and maybe that’s why he looked so pained every time the class got a little too rowdy. He would just sit in front of the class and wait. And wait.

Sometimes, he would take a piece of chalk, and pretend to smoke it. There was also a rumor that he could sometimes draw a bullseye on the blackboard, and throw chalk pieces to it.

Mostly, though, he just liked to turn his back to us, and teach us the math. One time, he did just that, and the problem took him a long time to solve. A long time. He would walk sideways, from left to right, writing his solution across the blackboard, then back to the left, on a second row, and so forth, until the blackboard was full, and he had to wipe off the first lines, the ones highest up, and continue there.

Finally, he came to the end.

“Aaaaand … 24 newtons,” he said, and smiled.

Most of the class was exhausted from copying his long calculations off the blackboard, but one young man, sitting in the front row, raised his hand.

“Excuse me? But the right answer at the back of the book is 25 newtons,” said the boy, who had obviously got the same answer when he had solved the problem, probably weeks ago.

“Really?” said Masa, and took a step back from the blackboard.

He grabbed a piece of chalk in his hand, supported his right arm with his left hand, and lifted the chalk to his lips. Then he inhaled. And exhaled. He bit his lip, as he went through the entire equation.

Finally, he took another puff of his “cigarette”, and nodded, mostly to himself. He walked to the blackboard and added “+1” to the end of the equation, wiped the “24” off the board and wrote “25” in its place.

“Is it the same now?” Masa asked the boy in the front row.

“Yes, sir,” he said.

“Great,” said Masa, and proceeded to the next problem.

Wife checked the back of the book, too. My answer was correct. Or, at least, the same as in the book. I threw the pencil back onto the table.

“Still got it,” I said.

Then I grabbed the pencil again, put it between my teeth, like it was a huge cigar, and leaned back in my chair.