Mathematics is the greatest game that I have ever been given. When I am walking by myself I think about math. It’s not always something we do in class, or something I have ever done in any class, but it is there. I toy with it, whether I’m playing with modular arithmetic, prime numbers, set theory, discrete math. I’m pretty variable. But what is math outside of my head? My friends often tell me it’s the manipulation of numbers, or the root of all sciences. Some of my friends who study math (and take it far too seriously) say it is the only ultimate truth in the universe. Usually I look at them and laugh, and explain that it is a toy for us to play with. Why? Math is a wholly abstract thing it is not something that exists anywhere except for inside our heads, and representations in the real world. While it has practical applications, and has enabled amazing scientific breakthrough, it is rare that math itself does anything that is exciting for people other than mathematicians. Secondly, math spreads its tentacles into everything. Art has math in the patterns that it creates. Music has math in the differences in vibrations between various notes. Science has math in its computations. Math has its own history, its own culture, and to some (who take it far too seriously) its own religion. But why then is it not the ultimate truth? Well place it in the real world and find me something which is not finite, whose parts cannot be counted; show me a closed set, a truly continuous function. If you look at it this way, you realize that without people to play with it, and attach it to other things, math is really quite helpless. It is for this reason that it can be nothing but a toy, meant for us to play with. My goal with math is simply to play with it for the rest of my life and hopefully find some connection between it and the real world, so that some other child will see my joy in the game, and start playing himself.