An Excuse to Eat Pie

Happy Pi Day!  I am not a mathematician.  I am not really all that into pie.  But I am a homeschooler (I can still claim that title even though all my kids are grown, right?).  And when my son was 7 years old (15 years ago), he found out that March 14th is Pi Day.  He was so delighted that he took it upon himself to try to memorize the value of Pi to as many digits as he could.  He found a website that showed Pi to 50,000 digits.  Ummm, yeah, he had his work cut out for him!  And he decided that we just had to do all sorts of fun things with Pi for school that day.

I don't have any clue as to why Pi held such a fascination for him.  It didn't tickle my girls in the least.  The best thing about Pi Day for them was that they got to have pie that day.  But Ricky was enamored.  He looked up the history of Pi.  He did mathematical calculations using Pi.  And yes, he ate pie -- at 1:59pm.  You know, 3.14159 (3/14 at 1:59pm).  Yes, he loved him some Pi.

Was Ricky a budding mathematician?  No, but he did love computers.  Did he grow to become a statistician?  No, but he kept his love for computers (mostly programming), graduated high school at age 15, and became a Marine at age 19.  Am I a proud mama?  Yep.  Can you tell?  Ha ha!

Why his childhood infatuation with Pi?  I have no idea.  But it was fun watching him learn.  And it's one of my favorite "Ricky" memories.  I don't think he even noticed that today is Pi Day, except for my post on his Facebook wall.  But even if he doesn't keep celebrating Pi Day, I will continue to have a slice of pie on March 14th at 1:59pm each year in his honor.  And one day, I will tell his children the story of when their daddy loved Pi.  And it will be a beautiful page in our family history.  All because of a little boy and his delight with a mathematical concept.

Thanks, Ricky, for showing me just how much fun learning can be.  I enjoyed my German Chocolate Pie from Marie Callender's just for you.  Kat had a slice of apple pie with a dollop of creamy vanilla ice cream on top.  But I think that was probably for her own enjoyment and didn't have anything to do with her big brother.  And that's okay, too!

How about all of you?  Did you celebrate Pi Day today?

~ Pia