silly, me!

It felt so awesome in school when no one in class knew an answer and yours would be the only raised hand.

The proud look on your teacher’s face that said “I knew you wouldn’t let me down.”

Her next look to the others that said, “Look at her and learn something!”

The scornful looks from stupid rival classmates that said “Show-off!” or “Teacher’s pet” or “Ha! Nerd”.

The happy, smiling looks from friends that simply said “Yay!”

I loved those looks. All of them. What satisfaction they gave!

Silly days.

One such thing happened in the seventh standard (we didn’t use the word ‘grade’ then) in the science period (that’s what ‘lectures’ were called in school) with Aruna Miss (all of them were called ‘Miss’ irrespective of their marital status). Silly lingo.

We were doing ‘Respiration’. Miss asked what breathing in and breathing out was called. All of us in unison said “Inhale and exhale”. She said; “Good. Can anybody tell me the synonyms for them?”

I almost jumped with the answer, then composed myself and quietly raised my hand. She smiled at me, but ignored my eager hand. She scanned the class for other hands but her eyes returned to me.

A guy called Sarvesh whispered to someone behind me, “What’s a synonym?” Silly Sarvesh.

“Okay I’ll give you one of them. To exhale is ‘to expire’. Does anybody know the opposite?”

Jessica asked me, “What is it?”

“Inspire.”

“Ey you’re mad or what! Inspire is like motivate.”

Miss overheard our conversation. She gave me a broader smile.

“’Inspire’ is the right answer. How do you know it?”

I was so happy! Not just because I got it right but mainly because just the previous day Daddy taught me those two words. I told her as much.

Jessica looked stupefied. Silly Jessica.