Math and Me

Next semester, I start my calculus sequence for my degree.
Many people cringe when I tell them this. But I am here to tell you that if I can do math, anyone can do math.
I was a bona fide remedial math student way back when. My teachers would get frustrated with me, and I even had to take a "special" math class when I got to college for my undergraduate at Kent State.
"Wow," teachers and counselors would say, "these math scores are low."
I don't mean to make anyone feel bad, but my father was great at math and he was teaching me math, and then he died. I'm not kidding. He stuck my nose in math workbooks well before I could even think about starting school.
Eventually, I got really, really good at Algebra. When I took the practice GMAT (graduate management assessment test), the woman handed me my scores and said, "I can't figure out how you did so poorly on math in general, but you did so well on the Algebra portions."
HELLO! Algebra has LETTERS. I can understand anything in terms of letters.
But understanding my weakness and knowing that I wanted the degree I wanted, I found a tutor. The tutor's name was Ananya, a lovely 18-year old lady from Bangledesh. She was fantastic at math; moreover, she could teach it.
I studied with Ananya for about a year, I think. The way she taught it, it just bore itself into my brain.
"Can we study at Starbucks?" I would ask.
"No, Angie, no," she would say. "You come to library and you study in quiet."
Her method worked. The thing is, I can understand math if I understand its purpose. I have to know why I'm doing something, and to what practical situation in my life it's going to apply, and then I can do it.
I'm not just going to work through math problems for the sake of working through math problems. But with the foundation I have from working with Ananya, I am very well prepared and I know the logic, which is the key to math.