My Flair for Prayer

Sitting in alphabetical order in high school English class, I hide behind Johnny Martinez’s wide, football fullback shoulders.  I am in a panic because the teacher announces a pop quiz.

I pull out a clean sheet of paper and shoot a quick prayer of desperation to God and His entire choir of angels as I write my heading and number one to five. 

God knows I am no slacker.  I always do my homework, but after tackling an entire chapter in my history book and doing all the odd-numbered math problems for Algebra II, the English poem about love, virgins, and seduction put me to sleep last night. 

What do I know about sex, especially written in complicated “olde” English?  I am sixteen, I have been kissed once on the lips by a non-relative, and I have been on a total of three dates, all heavily chaperoned by my mean and vindictive older brother.

I had no frame of reference as I read the poem, just some icky feeling that the poet had the hots for some zaftig maiden.

I promise God all sorts of things as the teacher rattles off the questions, and I attempt weak answers.  I promise to be kind to my younger sisters.  I promise to say a rosary every night to the Virgin Mother for one whole month.  I promise to control my impure thoughts about Johnny’s very wide, very muscley shoulders. 

Please, please, please, dear Lord, help me get through this quiz.  My A-plus average depends on this. 

We hand in our papers and the teacher goes over the quiz and the poem.  I get a sinking feeling that I will not get anything more than a few points on the quiz, but on the bright side, I won’t have to keep the promises I made in desperation.

To my surprise, the teacher returns our papers the next day and I have made an 80.  It must be a miracle or a mercy.  She explains that upon looking at our answers, she has reconsidered some of our answers and has accepted some of our literal interpretations though she expected a better understanding of the allusions. 

Her explanations the previous day helped me some with those, and I think it is funny that the poet and I had more in common that I first expected.  He wrote about his salacious attraction to a beautiful maiden and I spend most of English class wondering how it would feel to run my hands over Johnny’s double wide shoulders.

But now that God has kept His side of the deal, I will have to keep mine.