"You do a lot of math at your house."

That is what our neighbor, Tim's friend, said today during dinner. You see, a few weeks ago I was paying Tim back wages for mowing the lawn. I handed him (3) 5 dollar bills and this same friend instantly said, "WOW, 15 BUCKS!" I was impressed at how quickly he had calculated the total so right back at him I said, " Hey, what's 3 times 5." He looked at me with a blank face and said "I don't know". I said, "Sure you do. If you have 3 five dollar bills how much money do you have?" Instantly the reply was once again, "15 Bucks". So I repeated my original question and he thought and thought and then replied "15?" It struck me funny (in that not so funny way) how he could instantly multiply money but when it came to times tables he had a mind block on.

Strangely (or maybe not so much) over the next few times he visited we had on the spot math equations interspersed with our conversation. I began teasing him that he had to do a math problem before he went home. It didn't even hit me until tonight, when during dinner, this friend mentioned he had run at 12 miles an hour (for a brief moment) on his grandpa's treadmill. Wondering how fast that really was I said well the really good runners can do 4 minute miles. So, how long would it take you to go 1 mile on the treadmill? As my kids started calculating. (Some faster than others) Our mathaphobic friend said,

"You do a lot of math at your house."

Yes...I guess we do. It is such a normal part of our conversation I didn't even realize it.

I'll take that as a compliment.