Baby Names

On Halloween,
I planned a vocabulary lesson
for my Sophomore English students
that I called "Affix Asphyxiation."
The Whodunnit mystery, which covertly
taught my pigeon-speaking 15 year-olds
Greek, Latin, and  Anglo-Saxon affixes,
was going according to plan
when
one of the girls in class waved me over,
head tilted,
with a whimsical expression on her young, round face.
 
"Miss Schultz," she said
dreamily,
  "What does that word on that board mean?"
Her eyes sauntered from me to the board, and then back to me with a flutter of her eyelashes.
"It means
'to suffocate
or drown,'"
I replied, a bit bewildered by her question.
    "Oh," she replied with slightly bated breath,
smiling,
  "because...
   I wanna name my daughter that.
   It just looks so pretty."

Her eyes twinkled as her mind floated away
to the future image of her little daughter, Asphyxiation.
I decided to defend this poor unborn child, but to no avail.
I looked at the word on the board.
   "Maybe you could name her Sphynx," I suggested.
She looked at me with grave confusion.
    "Stinks?"
    "No...um...nevermind. Do you have any questions about the assignment?"
    "No," she chirpped.
    "Okay then." 
    It's not my fault, Asphy. I did my best.