Shut Up, Neva

"Shut up, Neva."

I swear that those three words comprise my first, middle, and last names. Since I began to talk, I don't think a day has gone by where this phrase hasn't made an appearance. My incessant questions, my desire to expose the truth, and my inability to accept that fact that not everybody gets the well placed Maude reference in everyday conversation.

The first time I've had this said to be by an entire classroom was in the second grade.

"Fact!" my oatmeal packet read. I was in the kitchen making myself breakfast on a gray day in February 1988, waiting for my mother to wake up and take me to school. "Christopher Columbus did not discover America, but the West Indies. He never made it to America."

My seven year-old world was rocked. Hard. I let the kettle whistle blow for a while as I steadied my dizzy head. I had just learned a few months ago that Columbus discovered the world was round and that he discovered America - could this oatmeal be telling the truth?

As class began that day, my second grade teacher, Mrs. Cahill, asked us if we had learned anything knew recently.

My hand must have made a sonic boom as it shot up. I prepared the class for the most earth shaking news they had ever heard. I did my best to set up that what I was about to say was going to change the way they looked at life.

"Columbus...did not discover America."

"Shut up, Neva." One classmate.

I tried to verify my statement. "It's true!"

"Shut up, Neva." Another classmate.

I tried to reach them with print. "I read it on my oatmeal packet! IT'S TRUE!"

"SHUT UP, NEVA!" Everybody.

What is odd is that I remember this chorus of "shut up" so clearly, I remember it happening in Mrs. Cahill's class, I remember getting my name on the board with a check mark telling someone else to shut up, and I do not remember anybody getting in trouble for saying this. Mrs. Cahill herself would have gotten a few as she muttered it under her breath as she shook her head in her hands, probably wondering why she had let me speak in class. Again.

What is crazy is that this became a grudge. In the sixth grade, when the truth about Columbus finally spilled out - when our social studies teacher, Mrs. Boatman, finally said out loud those words I had once said four years ago, I waited for the class to tell her to shut up. No one did and nobody even spoke a word...

..except me.

"You know, I found out about this in the second grade and nobody believed me!"

"Shut up, Neva."

I had to verify my statement. "It's true!"

"Shut up, Neva."

I had to reach them with print. "I read it on an oatmeal packet!"

"SHUT UP, NEVA!"

What is downright bonkers is that I am getting red faced just remembering this story. I just went to my class reunion this past June and recounted many specific stories about minor events that nobody remembered but me. And no one told me to shut up. They looked at me funny for a few moments, laughed, and went on. Wait. No. They looked at me funny, took a sip of their beer, laughed, and went on.

I think that means that sipping beer is the new "Shut up, Neva." Which is fine because I too had a beer. And I would sip it after they left. And I think that's the new "I read it on an oatmeal packet!"