My name is Lorenzo and I was born in Mexico City, but I’ve been living here in the United States for five years. While in the tenth grade I had an incident with my ESL teacher, Mrs. Del Signore.

It all began one night when I stayed up until midnight doing homework for the next day. When I finished, I put the homework paper on the dinner table and went to sleep. The next morning I woke up late and was in such a hurry to get to school on time that I forgot to take my homework.

In my ESL class, Mrs. Del Signore said, “Pass your homework to the front of your row.” Today, like every day, she used the homework to take attendance . So, after a few minutes, she asked, “Lorenzo Gonzales is not here?” I answered, “I’m here.”

She turned and looked at me and called me to her desk to ask me about the homework. When I explained what had happened, she answered, “Quit pulling my leg. I want the truth.”

I felt my face turning red. What she said didn’t make any sense. I wasn’t close enough to pull her leg. Besides, she was sitting at her desk, and it would have been practically impossible to pull her leg from under the desk. The whole class looked at her because theydid not understand her either. I’m sure I had a perplexed look on myface. When Mrs. Del Signore noticed it, she immediately realized the reason and apologized to me and the rest of the class. She explained what she meant by “pulling my leg”. She had thought I was kidding her about the homework, that I was just making up a story.

The next day she discussed idioms. We were eager to learn them, since we could clearly see they would come in handy sooner or later. As a result of this experience, to this day whenever I hear an idiom I do not understand, I simply go to my old high school and ask my friend Mrs. Del Signore.

我的名字叫洛伦佐，出生于墨西哥城，在美国已经生活了五年。上十年级的时候，我和英语老师德尔•西格诺雷夫人之间发生了一件事。

有天晚上我做作业一直做到半夜，做完之后把作业本放在餐桌上就去睡觉了。第二天早上起来晚了，急急忙忙跑去上学，忘了带作业本。

英语课上，西格诺雷夫人说：“把你们的作业本传到第一排来。”和每天一样，她用作业本来统计出勤情况。过了几分钟，她问道：“洛伦佐•冈萨雷斯没来吗？”我回答说：“来了。”

她转过身来看着我，叫我到讲台前问话。我把事情解释了一遍，她说：“‘别拽我的腿’(Quit pulling my leg)，我想听真话。”

我的脸一下子红了。她说的话没有什么意义啊！我离她很远，够不到她的腿。再者说，她坐在讲台后面，即使想去拽，也不可能碰到。全班同学都看着她，因为他们也不理解。我敢肯定自己当时的表情充满了疑惑。德尔•西格诺雷夫人注意到了，立刻明白是怎么回事，就向我和同学们道歉。她解释了“pulling my leg”的意思，她以为我是在骗她，是我自己编造的理由。

第二天她给我们讲解了成语俗语。我们都很愿意学，因为心里清楚早晚这些一定能派上用场。直到今天，每当听到一个不理解的成语时，很简单，我就回母校去问我的朋友，德尔• 西格诺雷夫人。