As I write this diary, I don’t think that I ever would be writing about my experiences in 1972. I couldn’t conceive beyond 1972, let alone fifty years later.

I was contemplating the roots of not following through and comparing languages with other subjects. It seems to be a pattern of a dilenttante. Furthermore, there doesn’t seem to be anything beyond plateaus. Concentration lacks details when in the forest.
In other words, I was so general that I lost the specific point. I recall it happened with the chain rule in calculus. Later I missed details in physics, taking years to convert from college to engineering physics. I was still trying to memorize later in 1977 for history and quantitative business analysis. I’m still seeking that efficient learning.

I began the rehash of econometrics and finance. The former appears quite different in light of programs that didn’t exist in 1978. It seems all roads lead to the same destination. I went back to the MIS course on matrix methods in data analysis, and I tried to visualize it.

I struggle with Chris Evans’s Multivariable Calculus, which I should had learned in high school and definitely before I took linear algebra, I finally learned of vectors. As I had written years ago on LinkedIn, missing background would cause problems with mathematics. Now I think I should have studied the subject those summers instead of languages. My latest peruse “The Loom of Language” suggests that I wasn’t as through when I read it at the time.

Combat came on again, and the huge difference between perception then and now. I can understand some of the French and German. I also understand the encounters, but I am still numb to the violence.