"Thank You So Much for the Bell"

When Chandra was in 8th grade, she had to come up with a science project. She decided to do something electric. The child actually wanted to do something "hands-on" that would shock people, but we talked her out of that.

(This was the same year she dressed as a clown, all in black, for Halloween.)

So, her final choice was to illustrate an electrical circuit, using a 12 Volt battery and a doorbell. I was on my way out to buy a doorbell, when Brendan's Dad said he had one we could use. Naturally, we were happy about getting a doorbell free, so we said no more about it. I did notice that, when hooked up, Jimmy's doorbell made the windows rattle, but even that didn't prepare me for what was to come.

That evening, when we went to the school for the Science Fair, the projects were lined up in the halls. We saw Stonehenge made out of sugar cubes. We saw a log cabin with husks from a pine cone for shingles. We saw the usual baking-soda volcanoes. All of them had been out all day, to be admired by passing students. The murmur of shuffling feet, squealing kids and complimentary parents was punctuated with random bursts from an unidentified buzzer that rivalled the school's.

But I STILL remained clueless until we were approaching the 8th Grade hall, and Chandra's teacher came up to me. She was about 6 feet tall, with red hair, and for some reason she looked a little frazzled. Light dawned when she bared her teeth in an unforgiving grimace and said,

"Thank you SO MUCH for the bell, Mrs. Biggs."