Love and Hate for Chemistry
Chemistry. Chem·is·try.
It was one of the subjects among few others that I disliked during my halcyon days of high school years. Chemistry felt different from physics or mathematics where after learning a few basic principles, the rest could be deduced using hierarchical reasoning. Physics and mathematics seemed logical. All I needed to do was to learn a few axioms of number theory and use them as the building blocks of lofty structures of increasingly complex theorems.
Chemistry, on the other hand, was a different beast — dark, mystical, magical. I never figured out the rhyme and reason of balancing the left- and right-hand side of the chemical reactions, and never understood what the basic principles were.
To barely manage passing grades and advance into the next class, I memorized the chemical reactions to the extent the neurons would hold, gave the exam and the very next day promptly forgot everything about them.
There was no pleasure in that process of trying to learn chemistry.
Perhaps it was because of the chemistry teacher we had, but that might just be deflecting blame.
Whatever the reason, I never developed an interest in chemistry and was thrilled that after 12th grade, I did not have to take any chemistry classes or prepare for annual examinations. It was an amicable separation. Little did I know that later in life I would begin to appreciate chemistry, and I do not mean the chemistry between me and other fellow beings.
Throughout the history of my youth and decades that followed, the relevancy of chemistry in life did not catch or hold my attention.
In the torrent of youth and following that in the years of building a career, lots of trivial and important aspects of life, and about who I am, took a back seat. It is only now that I am past 60 and the single-minded focus on my career has receded leaving me with the feeling of the spaciousness of time and space that I realize the importance of chemistry, and of chemical reactions in life that I so much disliked.
And now, now, I see the profound influence of chemistry of small molecules, their interactions, and their contributions to the intricate steps in dance of life. Perhaps now being more aware of the world around, and the world within, has brought the magic workings of small molecules, and of chemistry to the fore.
Take the grass in our front yard. One serving of fertilizer, and it turns from pale green to looking like a lush green carpet. All I am giving it is a 21–22–4 mix of Nitrogen-Phosphorous- Potassium (NPK) and with one serving, grass is all smiles.
Being a diabetic, I can see the fingerprints of what I eat at dinner on the blood sugar the next morning. A meal with a larger amount of carbohydrates, although so pleasing, comes back to haunt with higher level of blood sugar the next morning.
Take a small pill of medication, or some other mind-altering chemical, and like a magic potion the entire body reacts as if I have taken gobs of a chemical that are not part of my daily regimen.
It is only now that I am beginning to realize that the biology of life is all made of chemical reactions. The proteins that genes create carry on the task that is assigned to them by shape determined by their molecular structure. Molecules act as messengers in every kind of process going on within my body and have magically allowed me to celebrate my 65th birthday which will be coming soon.
Now that I am getting older, I am so much more cognizant of what my hands bring to my mouth. If I am not mindful, the hands are always singing the siren song that plays along the lines of — come my love, it is just one more honey glazed donut, how bad could it be when it tastes like heaven above? And to those lyrical words, our hearts cave in.
Oh well. There is not much I can do about the youthful indulgences and fallacies of the past. But in the present, with new respect for chemistry and what it means for the cellular functions in my body, now we head out to organic food stores, and thankfully, have the financial wherewithal to be able to do that.
I now stay away from loading my plate with carbs — no rice, no pasta, and yes, no donuts, no fun. Well, not really. With creativity such food still tastes good.
Perhaps, I should also be more cognizant of what I am feeding the grass in the front yard. The 21–22–4 NPK mixture may ultimately turn out to be what donuts are to my body.
It is time to let go of my aversion to chemistry and learn the meaning behind you are what you eat or realize that meaning behind what Hippocrates said, “Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food.”
Ciao.
