Sleepy Beth Can Moo, Can You

In the 9th grade, one of the special classes we had was called Principals of Technology. Aside from the fun we had letting our friends know that we had to go take POT next and all the other assorted juvenile jokes that come from such a class name (they changed the name about seventeen times while I still went there), we had the opportunity to do a little project in each of the technology labs. One of these labs was the biotechnology lab. Ostensibly our project involved cloning African violets - and there might have been other things, I know, for example, that I learned that petri dishes are filled with agar, something that has benefited me in many crossword puzzles. But beyond that, the only thing I really remember was learning to wash my hands using the aseptic technique.

I can't exactly recall all the steps of the aseptic technique for hand washing, but I do remember that it's called the aseptic technique because the teacher drummed those words into our heads like a martinet. Now, even as I type them out, I hear them recited in her thick Indian accent.

My clone didn't work. I have always attributed it to the fact that I have a black thumb. I can't grow plants that come to me already healthy. I never even thought there was a chance that I would be able to, essentially, make one from scratch.

Last night as I lay miserably on the bathroom floor, whimpering and exhausted from emptying my already emptied stomach yet again, it occurred to me that perhaps my violet failed to clone because I did not master the art of the aseptic technique.