There I sat watching the students; the only sound came from the clock’s ticking second hand which seemed to move increasingly slower as my borborygmy grew increasingly louder. (And yes, I did have to look up the spelling of borborygmy).

My mind drifted back to the morning before when I returned my signed packet of “proctor” instructions to the school office receptionist.  While exiting the office a young wisenheimer, probably a juvenile delinquent called in to see the principal, I later concluded, looked up at me and said “Howdy Pop.”  The overly innocent tone of this boy’s voice together with his choice of greetings set off a chain reaction in my brain which resulted in my conclusion that he was calling me over-the-hill.

So there I sat with nothing to do except to count the number of brand names on the students’ clothes. Then like a sudden itch that needs immediate attention, the unresolved mysterious “Pop” returned to my consciousness. Like a scientist analyzing all the causes of an experiment gone wrong, I pondered the term. I had no idea just how busy those three little letters would make me. I took out a piece of paper, and started scribbling.  The next sound I heard was the teacher’s voice, “Pencils down,” so I put my pencil down. Here’s what I wrote.

 Pop I realized was an important word, for pop is an example of all of the following:

Onomatopoeia for the sound made when a balloon pops.

Palindrome for pop is spelled the same backwards and forwards

Homonym for pop means to burst, and pop means dad

Colloquialism for pop means soda in certain geographic areas.

Acronym  for pop means  point of presence, an access point to the internet

Abbreviation for pop is short for popular

Jargon  for in baseball a hit which is easily caught is called a  pop fly

Noun for pop means Father

Verb  for pop means to ask as in pop the question

Adjective for pop describes some music

Adverb  for pop describes some verbs as in I’ll pop by

I just realized I figured out everything I ever wanted to know about the word pop . . . except maybe what that kid meant by “Howdy Pop.”