Fear is a reaction; courage is a decision
There was no way I was going to raise my hand and reveal to the entire class that I am the dumb one in the room.
I'm sitting in 8th grade algebra. Mrs. Bickar just dropped the quadratic equation on us, and although I didn't get it, there was no way I was going to raise my hand and reveal to the entire class that I am the dumb one in the room.
"Are there any questions?" she asked.
Suddenly we all felt an urge to look at our shoes. The only sound in the room was the clicking of her metal chalk holder hitting against the rings on her fingers as she rolled it between her two hands.
"Please, are there any questions? Any at all? I sense some of you may be lost."
I tried to muster the courage to raise my hand, but I just could not.
"Go ahead and ask," she exhorted, "It's okay; there is no such thing as a dumb question."
Then it happened: Tracy McConaughey, one of the prettiest and most confident girls in the school raised her hand.
"I have a question," she said.
"Oh thank heavens!" I thought. "No one is going to think less of Tracy for asking — and by the look of things, she is going to save us all!"
You could hear the entire room exhale in relief.
"Why," she asked, "Is the carpet blue in our classroom, and red in the hallway?"
Our teacher's jaw dropped.
The whole room burst into laughter.
Okay, maybe there *is* such a thing as a dumb question!
The cool thing was I could see by the grin on her face that Tracy did it on purpose to break the tension.
And it worked; immediately we were asking and learning and were able to move forward.
The great philosopher, Lucille Ball, once said, "I'm not funny. What I am is brave."
I never forgot what a bit of courage and humor did for us that day, and have tried to find a bit of both inside myself when occasion calls.
