An NB Problem: If They/Then What…

Definitions

NP – nondeterministic polynomial time, a classification of computational complexity. Difficult because of the need to resolve connected conditions. NB – nonbinary, a classification of one of many gender identities. Difficult because of societal norms.

For a very brief portion of my life, I went to a private Catholic school. I was in the fifth or sixth grade, just old enough to be interested in everything and just young not to understand religious dogma. A bunch of visiting priests were giving various presentations about their missions in various parts of the globe, and one had brought a Chinese Zodiac calendar primer. You know, the type you’d find at a restaurant, except perhaps a little fancier. And I was instantly enamored with this sheet of paper and immediately started asking every classmate and every teacher either what year they were born in or how old they were so I can figure out their zodiac sign. This does not sit well with one of my very Catholic priest-in-training teachers who thought what I was doing was near sacrilege and confiscated the paper and reluctantly returned it to me at the end of the day.

From The Chinese Zodiac Calendar

And I know it’s very much a stereotype for queer folk to be obsessed with zodiacs and Tarots, but there is something to be said about the value of self-assigned iconography and symbology. I mostly mention this because my high school math teacher once told me, “it’s easy to solve a problem when you know the answer,” …