Hello, I Am Not Caramel by Emily Written in 2003 Why, hello there, lucky reader. Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Carlotta McSmith and I am very pleased to make your acquaintance. Oh yes, very pleased indeed. Would you mind terribly if I told you a bit about myself, just in case you want to learn about me? I bet you'll even want to be my friend. To start with, as I said before, my name is Carlotta. It's not exactly an ordinary name, and sometimes it causes trouble. Oh yes, much trouble indeed. For example, one day - specifically, the very first day of Mrs. Brian's third grade reading class - a boy named Joshua turned to me and asked me, "What's your name?" When I told him what I am called, he looked at me with his nose all scrunched up and a little glimmer in his eye and said to me, "What kind of name is that? Why not just call you Caramel?" I tried to make fun of his goofy, plaid hat, but I wasn't yet a master of comebacks and he was able to slip in a jibe about my curly hair that always flips up and ask if I was sure that my name wasn't Carl a few seconds later. That just about did it. I turned around and ran out of the classroom and to the girls' room to think up my revenge and cry my little, third-grade eyes out because Joshua had insulted my name - my name, the name I love, the name that represents all that is Carlotta Jessica McSmith. That incident was resolved a little while later after Mrs. Brian, good teacher that she is, explained to Joshua that my name, my beautiful name, was perfectly fine and gorgeous and fit for the princess that I am and that Joshua was being a toad by calling me Caramel. All right, so she didn't really say that he was a toad, but I figured that out all by myself. Most of the boys at my school are toads. They all think they're better than the girls just because they're taller and their mothers don't ever make them wear silly "feminine" clothes. During lunch, the boys always chase the girls. I tried to join them last year because I like to run, but the boys didn't want me since I'm a girl and the girls just laughed at me. It was a mock-mock situation, if you ask me. This year I just sit on the brick wall and eat my lunch alone. I don't run away from the boys because they don't chase me, and I don't chase them because they probably wouldn't even run from me. The only other person who eats lunch on the brick wall is James. I don't really like James. He wears only navy clothing, even on Halloween, and never says yes to anything. I tried once to get him to join up with me to form our own little chasing gang but his nose started bleeding after I chased him in my sincere effort to get him to agree. The teachers on duty got angry and it didn't work out, so I don't talk to James anymore. That's the only time the school has ever had to call my parents. Usually I'm very obedient. I do all my work, I talk to the other kids whenever I have to, I'm quiet unless I don't want to be, and I've never gone to school naked. The weirdest thing I've ever worn is just a gorilla suit that I'd worn to somebody's dress-up party a few years before. My mother didn't want me going out looking like a monkey, but I explained to her that a gorilla isn't the same as a monkey, I promised not to eat any bananas at lunch, and she let me go. Mrs. Brian was pretty surprised to see me wearing the gorilla suit, but, since I was covered up and wasn't making any funny noises or going to the bathroom in any strange places, she let me stay that way. She probably meant that I was creative, daring, and fun when she said, "My, don't you look interesting today, Carlotta!" and gave me that look she gives kids before she sends them to see the principal. Naturally, when she said that, I beamed and responded with an enthusiastic "Yes!" She must have thought I made a cute gorilla, and I can't say that she was wrong. I guess some things turn out to be more useful than they seem. I first wore that gorilla suit to my best friend - or ex-best friend - Molly's party. That didn't go quite as well. All the other girls were dressed like butterflies or angels, and I wasn't, so they ignored me and Molly pretended that she didn't even know me. Never mind the gigantic teddy bear I'd given her or that we'd met before kindergarten and lost two baby teeth together. Never mind that we had been best friends forever and she knew all my secrets. I was a gorilla, so I'm not her friend anymore. That's what she says, anyway. The truth is that I don't even want to be because she's bossy and has to have things her way, including my outfits. She's not my friend anymore. Anyway, back to me. I stand four feet three inches tall when I'm not wearing shoes. My mother says that someday I will grow to be at least five feet, five very tall and proud feet, but I have decided that I like being short. I do stand tall, and I already am proud of my feet, my four and one fourth feet. I hope you don't mind that I don't have a few extra inches. If you do, please tell me so that I'll know to stop gushing over my short height. But I hope you know that I really am proud. Someday I'll write a novel about how great it is to be short; I doubt anyone else has thought of that. And that's not all there is about me! Oh no, there is much more indeed. Did you know, for example, that I attend Duckton New School every single day or that I am in Mr. Drake's fourth grade homeroom - the very same homeroom that lost the spelling bee against Mrs. Brian's class last year thanks in big part to me and the word "broccoli"? No, I didn't think you did. And did you know, for another example, that I want to be a famous doctor when I grow up and that I plan to save many lives, write books all about my groundbreaking discoveries and inspiring operations, and win a Nobel Prize? Well, I do. And I'm pretty sure I will, because I really will be a good doctor. I've already diagnosed many things. Take the time my brother had appendicitis. I knew it right away after he screamed and clutched his side. I knew it! I ran to my parents and I told them immediately what he had and that they needed to give him some appendix juice (which is really apple juice - that's a secret that all doctors know, you know). I even wrote a story about what happened just for fun; I submitted it to the teacher and she told me it was very exciting. Someday I will save a horse or another doctor and I will win the Pulitzer three times in a row and on the "Name" line of my certificate it's going to say, "Carlotta 'Not Caramel' J. McSmith." Everyone is going to refer his or her brother and second cousin to me for medical emergencies, and maybe I'll even write my own dictionary definition of "second cousin" because my mother's just makes my head spin! Don't be surprised if I get a Caldecott Medal by the time I'm seventeen. I'm going to be the greatest. Just you wait and see. I could tell you oh so much more about me, but right now I think I'll let you decide for yourself if you want to know more or not. At this point, you know enough to know that I'm Carlotta McSmith, soon-to-be-famous doctor, esteemed speller, enemy of plaid hat boys, proud-of-her-short-height fourth grader. Someday you'll be lining up to get a book autographed with my name (which you better not ever make fun of!). So why wouldn't you want to get to know me?