Quick question, one of my friends put this on my birthday cake one year, ln[6 - √(x + 3)] = ln[4 - √(x - 6)], how old was i? A little complicated isn't it, but even this is nothing compared to the complexity of school politics, the hierarchy and structure of who is who, is amazing and probably more so now than back then. You had the basic groups, the rich kids, the bully, the popular kids, the loners and the rest. And apart from the one kid with the big brown glasses with tape on the bridge, that was it. Nowadays you even have your style types to contend with, you have your emos and your chavs, your jocks and your indies, to name but a few. See I was one of the rest, nothing special, not clever or rich, just normal, but that day I had broken the rules of school politics, I had changed my socially accepted peer group. It took me about 3 months and another 6 after school fights to establish myself as a completely new group, a group of 1 'the nutter' although I saw myself as more of a protector. I would beat the living daylights out of any of the rich, or popular kids that so much as looked at me wrong, but would hang around with the weedy kid in glasses, or the one with the asthma pump, the bullies could not touch them anymore. I had broken school politics and it felt good.
Mum and dad had a very clever way of sitting us kids down and telling us things were going to change, they did it in such a way, we always felt involved, even though we really weren't. So we were moving again, back to the south east. Why? You know, to this very day I really don't know why, I was 13 and didn't really understand it all. But we packed up and left, within a month or so we were back down south. Dad was working as a milkman and mum was working in an office, I was pretty much on my own now as both my sisters had left home, one was married and the other at college. I joined a local school and within 2 weeks I had hunted down the school bully and beaten him to a pulp, it was then I found he was my mums bosses son! Ops. Lots of grovelling to my mum got me out of that one, but more importantly to me, in under 2 weeks I had done it again, I, was once again the school nutter, this was so easy another couple of years here and I can leave, no hassle.
It was here I met Chad and Morris, 2 lads that would become 2 of my closest friends, we met bunking off the cross country run in PE. I used to hide in the bushes and have a smoke until it was time to come in, they had ready found the best spot behind the main fence, no one could see us, or the plumes of smoke and we got on, all 3 of us right from the very start. Morris was my age, Chad was a little older, that was handy for getting the smokes in. Morris was a simple, gentle quiet soul, I don't think I ever heard him raise his voice once in all the years I knew him, and clever I mean really clever. He used to get bullied because he had dark thick curly hair and braces. Chad on the other hand was loud and full of himself, he was so handsome, blonde hair, good skin, blue eyes, and oh boy, didn't he just know it.
We had know each other for about 9 months, we used to refer to ourselves as "the three of us". We were sitting on the grass outside the school gates. "Sorry to have to say this guys" I said with a worried tone. "But I'm moving away." Morris looked up from his book and pushed his glasses up his nose, "When? Where?" he said, "We need details". I laid back on the grass and signalled to Chad to throw me a smoke. "nooo" Chad replied, "Details, then smoke." I lent forward, "my mum and dad are moving back to Wales, sorry guys, got no choice" I told them, making hand gestures to Chad, he threw me a smoke. We lit up and it was there and then I found out what true friendship is. Chad laid back blowing smoke rings into the air. "Well" he said thoughtfully "can't be helped, but, we all swear now, never to lose touch. Agreed?" we shook hands "Agreed" we all said together.
That summer, I spent in Wales with my dad as mum sold the house in the south east, maybe this would be our last move? Maybe not, either way I would not lose touch with Chad and Morris.
Oh yeah, the answer. ln[6 - √(x + 3)] = ln[4 - √(x - 6)] = 22 where x is the two dates.
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