Losing the Path

My repeat internship at the goat creamery left me with some new ideas, but the same problem of not having a solid plan. As usual, many different paths forward cycled through my head, but I was unsure which one was “right.” Fortunately, the baker manning the ovens, henceforth known as my ‘buddy’, was set to visit so that I could educate him in the art of brewing. I had planned on running my ideas by him.

As we worked through the mash, sparge, and boil, I explained to my buddy that I was considering opening up my own small ‘microbakery’ or Craft Bakery in Erfurt. I had been spending much of my free time thinking through where I would like to open my hobby school back in the US. Through this process, I continued to use Erfurt as my starting point in terms of size, tourist potential, and wealth and education. As one may expect, it dawned on me that I should be considering remaining in Erfurt where the storefront rents are less than a third of that in the states, and there is a variety of funding available for start-ups; the government actively supports such efforts.

I explained my thought process and awaited his judgement. His response was, ‘you may now be a master baker, but you are not a baker.’ Three months later and this sentence still haunts me; although in that time, I have reinterpreted the advice a hundred different ways. Regardless, he recommended that I may be more suited to continue studying here if I have decided to remain longer in Germany. Seeing wisdom in his advice, I threw away my thoughts of opening a storefront and started considering what and where I would study.

Were I not a baker, then what was I? My passion remains cheese and its production. Given that, I reached back out the goat creamery and asked for their thoughts on what and where I could study. As owners both hold doctorates in agriculture and are active members of trades organizations in the country, they put me in contact with the chairman of the cheese production trade organization in all of Germany. I had an insightful 30 minute discussion that included my background and my goals. He then recommended three masters programs, as I did not want to pursue a third undergraduate degree.

After researching the three programs, one was easily stricken out as it focused on the engineering side of cheese production equipment. Before I reached out to the schools, I dropped a note to Dumbledore to get his opinion on the schools as he had studied food chemistry, which was a parallel to the suggested study programs I was considering. We set up a phone call where he pointed out that a masters program is much more difficult than the master baker program and that it required ‘self-study’, which he believed I could master. I cannot adequately formulate how condescending that discussion was, but I do believe he was trying to be helpful. Perhaps he had not considered what the actuarial exam process involved. Regardless, it ended up being a short conversation.

Emails were then sent out to the two remaining schools. One never responded, the other simply replied with: “As you mentioned you are not a typical candidate for this program. And I’m not sure you have the right idea about this program.” And that concluded that path. Proceed with backtracking.

If having the undergraduate degree to support that masters was of significance, I should be considering continuing the math angle. In such a program, I could still be working on my goal to master fermentation analyses through a highly-technical lens. I reached out to the pure math department at a well-known university not far from Erfurt and explained my background and what my goals would be in my studies there.

The pure math department head said that I should probably be talking with the business math department, given that I had worked as an actuary. The business math department head responded, “first you must write a proof:”

Given are m real numbers z(1), z(2), …, z(m). Some of them are positive, some may be negative. The total sum is zero. Prove the following statement: There exists some index i such that all the following m sums are non-negative:

z(i)

z(i) + z(i+1)

z(i) + z(i+1) + z(i+2)

…

z(i) + z(i+1) + z(i+2) + … z(i+m-1)

Here “plus” and “minus” within the brackets are meant modulo m.

And, wanted to see where this led, I responded with an essay version of how I would approach this proof and explained that it has been over 15 years since I have written a proof. And repeated that I worked as an applied mathematician in the real world. Nevertheless, he responded with, “I looked through your arguments. Unfortunately, it is far away from something that might be called a proof. My serious impression is that you would not survive in our Master programs, neither in Mathematics nor in Business Mathematics. We would not admit you.” He suggested I reach out to the computational and data science department. I decided not to. And that concluded that path. Proceed with backtracking.

By this point, I had been working on setting up my internships for the fall and had already filled out my calendar through the end of the year. Studying was not the solution; was I wrong about opening up a bakery? Should I have been giving so much weight to my buddy’s advice? I had given up on finding the ‘right’ next step; I now needed a next step.

My summer ended with an envelop in the mail. One of the teachers at the baking academy had sent me a hand-written note. I had given her a brief rundown of my struggles to find a path, that would still lead me to fermentation glory. Her note reiterated her wishes that I find the right path, but reminded me not to change who I am during the struggle. Stay true to yourself. Thank you, Sales Lady!