The complaint had to have come from Keith Appleton, the least social and the biggest snob in the building, if not on campus, if not in the state of Massachusetts.

“Friday was Tesla’s birthday,” I said, with great restraint.

“Whose birthday?”

“The physics department chose the theme for July. They selected Nicola Tesla. He was born on July 10. Well, at midnight on July 9, so it could go either way.”

“Tesla?” the dean asked.

I nodded. “I’m sure you’ve heard of his work in electricity.” I pointed to the lovely Victorian-style lamp on the dean’s desk, as if it were an example of Tesla’s great genius. I thought what a nice jigsaw puzzle the lampshade would make.

I’d deliberately spoken as if I assumed science and mathematics literacy on the part of anyone who deemed herself liberally educated. Or anyone who was a dean at a liberal arts college.

“He was there? At your party?”

I grunted-inaudibly, I hoped-though Dr. Underwood’s severe lack of appreciation for math and science was familiar to me. “No, he, uh, died about seventy years ago.” I fantasized Dean Underwood’s name on my class roster and marked it with a failing grade.

“Of course he did.” Dean Underwood’s pointy nose seemed to take off on its own, now with flaring nostrils, now curling upward toward her frown lines.

I wasn’t proud of this little tactic-putting someone in her place by trying to sound smarter. The truth was that, given the right teacher, anyone could learn mathematics. One of my greatest missions in life was to help students over hurdles that kept them thinking that there was a certain “science brain” or that only a select few had a “knack for math.”

I bristled as I recalled a report from Bruce’s niece, Melanie, that her fourth-grade teacher had promised, “If you behave yourselves this morning, boys and girls, we won’t have to do math this afternoon.”