Dear Math Teachers

remember how you told me that i might be interested in spending my free time doing my homework, or spending my class time actually paying attention rather than drawing cartoons during both? you had this theory-- and not a very mathematical one, oddly enough-- that you explained. it went something like this:

if you continue to draw cartoons in my class, you will fail my class. if you continue to fail math classes, you will not be able to get a job in the real world.

and i did fail your class. every year of high school. i thought you would've been impressed that when you said to draw a cube, i drew a square-headed cuban carrying a missile. it was a missile crisis reference. but i suppose math teachers don't know much about history classes and it became understood quickly that you disapproved of any form of creativity regardless of references.

you made me feel absolutely moronic because i couldn't understand the purpose behind proving a triangle was a triangle, and because i referred to the fact algebra was math with numbers and letters as "when math just wants to fuck with you."

i've never been smooth with my words, but you didn't have to be such a shit about it all. you spent four years of the most impressionable part of my life trying to convince me that i was an idiot because my mind didn't work in numbers the same way it worked with images.

but look at this:

that is a cartoon dragon, smoking a cigarette while saying something condescending. in my imagination, he's talking to you and saying, "gobble a sloppy 8===D (that's an algebraic penis) because you were wrong and you were mean."

a sloppy eight equals equals equals capital d in your mouth, moving around, i hate you.

i drew him on a post-it note to compete for a position illustrating for a company that had seen one of my previous cartoons.

and i got the job!

why? certainly not because i know anything about derivatives or cosines or whatever else you jabbered on about, but because the other eleven artists-- some of which were very talented-- were what the employer described as "either too mathematical or just lacking a sense of humor."

so there it is.

i am officially a paid illustrator with deadlines, and meetings, and other stuff that happens in the real world. how about that?

hahainyourfacely,
president wishnack

p.s. you seriously hurt my feelings for four years straight and i feel so good right now. go teach your class and i'll draw my cartoon dragons and one day you'll see them and say, "oh, i am such an idiot." and then, i'll appear out of nowhere and say, "maybe you would be smarter if you didn't draw so much during math class." and then you will cry.