As Hamming describes, it was very much for me: 8th grade plane geometry feels now like an intellectual awakening. The satisfaction of proving "pons asinorum",

As Hamming describes, it was very much for me: 8th grade plane geometry feels now like an intellectual awakening. The satisfaction of proving "pons asinorum", by Euclid's method, followed by vexation at learning I had overlooked the much simpler reflexive approach.