Despite attending some of the finest ICSE schools,I've never been good at the English language.We all are aware of the well known apothegm "A little knowledge is dangerous".I've been through many embarrassing situations because of the lack of mastery on the language.
In school,we had a beautiful lady named "Natasha" who used to teach us English.She was just out of college and had that "girlish charm" that usually can be seen only among teens.It was a grammar class and she was teaching us tenses.I was a "nut" in my school days and even now many of my friends think of me in that way.I always used to confuse between the different participles of lie and lay.As she said in her usual "as sweet as honey" tone, "Children, lie has got 3 forms: present,past and past participle.They are lie,lay,lain".Unfortunately,God has bestowed on me an extremely "curious" mind which makes me immensely restless.I raised my hand and asked,"Miss,what are the various forms of lay?"She retorted back,"it's lay,laid and laid".Not very pleased with my reply,she asked me to frame some sentences using the the various forms of lay.I stormed my brain and came up with the following answers:
*I lay on the bed.
*I got laid yesterday night.
After replying,I gave miss a " dirty smile" which i normally do when I confidently answer something.Listening to my answer,she got furious.Her "creamy" faced turned "RED".I was in 9th standard and she was some 7 odd years older than me.She frowned,"Idiot,are you aware what crap you are speaking".I was dumb-founded and had no clue where I had gone wrong.She rushed to me and BANG................I received the SLAP of my life!I could feel the marks left by her soft fingers.She was blushing........I still had no clue.She then left the classroom.Henceforth,I was made to stand on the last bench in all her classes.
It was only when I joined engineering college and started watching movies like "American Pie,Euro trip,road trip et al" that I understood I was a real moron to say to a young lady...."Miss.I got laid yesterday night".That was really embarrassing!!!
PS:Though the backdrop of the post is true,the characters and situation are fictional.
