The Sin of Addition
I'm beginning to wonder if there's a form of dyslexia that only applies to numbers. I've been doing the daily costs/earnings reports for my company, and while most of it is automated, there is still a part of it that requires me to do simple addition by hand. Three different totals from three columns of numbers, every day. Well, in the 15 working days of August so far, I managed to fuck up 8 totals, which my supervisor had to make me fix. Which, out of 45, is pretty awful, especially for a college graduate. And we're not just talking a few cents. One of my totals was off by almost $1000. And I spend literally about 20 minutes a day doing these totals. With a calculator. Rechecking my work at least once. And with the numbers printed up right in front of me.
So now I've been set up with a special table in Microsoft Excel that does everything for me so long as I type in the numbers. I feel like I'm in the third grade. Seems like I get dumber the older I get. I haven't even taken a math class since high school. And those I barely managed to pass.
I'm not sure what it is about numbers, but they just don't hold anything memorable for me. If I look at a string of words, I have the capacity to memorize it based on the images it evokes in my mind. Even if I don't know what a word means, the letters still have a "feel" to them that I can grab onto, or I can infer what the word means from context or a Latin/Greek root. But when I look at numbers, they are absolutely meaningless. Just symbols. I have to rely solely on spatial memory (almost like taking a mental photograph) to recall a number. I could get a sequence of them mixed up and not ever know. At least words have syntactic rules to prevent that from happening in most cases. And to give you an idea of how bad it is, I still get my own phone number wrong. And I've had it for 3 years.
So I'm worried, needless to say. My boss is emotionally unreadable most of the time, but he winced when he saw the newly corrected reports for the month so far. I feel like I should be hiding under my bed like a cat. It wasn't anything 100% crucial, because I only make these reports for the benefit of the head honchos, so they can see how the company is faring. So no money is lost. But still, can't make me look good. And short of picking up some sort of math learning software for toddlers, I don't know what the hell I can do about it.
And jeez, am I that eager to invent a mental disorder so I don't have to hold myself accountable for being careless?
So now I've been set up with a special table in Microsoft Excel that does everything for me so long as I type in the numbers. I feel like I'm in the third grade. Seems like I get dumber the older I get. I haven't even taken a math class since high school. And those I barely managed to pass.
I'm not sure what it is about numbers, but they just don't hold anything memorable for me. If I look at a string of words, I have the capacity to memorize it based on the images it evokes in my mind. Even if I don't know what a word means, the letters still have a "feel" to them that I can grab onto, or I can infer what the word means from context or a Latin/Greek root. But when I look at numbers, they are absolutely meaningless. Just symbols. I have to rely solely on spatial memory (almost like taking a mental photograph) to recall a number. I could get a sequence of them mixed up and not ever know. At least words have syntactic rules to prevent that from happening in most cases. And to give you an idea of how bad it is, I still get my own phone number wrong. And I've had it for 3 years.
So I'm worried, needless to say. My boss is emotionally unreadable most of the time, but he winced when he saw the newly corrected reports for the month so far. I feel like I should be hiding under my bed like a cat. It wasn't anything 100% crucial, because I only make these reports for the benefit of the head honchos, so they can see how the company is faring. So no money is lost. But still, can't make me look good. And short of picking up some sort of math learning software for toddlers, I don't know what the hell I can do about it.
And jeez, am I that eager to invent a mental disorder so I don't have to hold myself accountable for being careless?