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She stuck out her tongue at me as Ms. Hannah came over to our table.
    â€œA.J., you haven’t finger painted a thing,” Ms. Hannah said.
    I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know what to say. I had to think fast. “I did too finger paint something,” I said. “This is a picture of a white polar bear. He’s playing in the snow. White snow. And he’s eating…vanilla ice cream!”
    All the kids were looking at me. Ms. Hannah was looking at me. I was afraid she was going to yell or go get Miss Daisy from the teachers’ lounge to take me to the principal’s office.
    â€œVery nice finger painting, A.J!” Ms. Hannah said with a big smile on her face. “That’s using your creativity!”
    Hahaha! I stuck my tongue out at Andrea. She folded her arms across her front all mad-like.
    It was great. It was not only great. It was the greatest moment in the history of the world. This was the next best thing to an elephant stepping on Andrea’s head.

    Pretty soon it was time to clean up. Ms. Hannah taught us a song about cleaning up. The words were, “Clean up, clean up, everybody everywhere. Clean up, clean up, everybody do their share.”
    It was a pretty dumb song, and me and Michael and Ryan changed the words to “Clean up, clean up, even in your underwear.”
    Any time anybody says a word that rhymes with “air,” you should always change it to “underwear.” Everybody will laugh. Believe me, this works every time.
    Ms. Hannah peeled the sheets of painty newspaper off our desks and stuck them on a ball that was sitting on the windowsill. The ball was about the size of a beach ball.
    â€œWhat are you doing, Ms. Hannah?” Michael asked.
    â€œI’m making a newspaper ball,” she said.
    â€œWhy?” we all asked.
    â€œOld newspapers with paint all over them can be art. This is my art. Like I said, art is everywhere. And this way, nothing goes to waste. I don’t like waste. If you lookaround, you’ll see that I don’t even have a garbage can in here.”

    We looked around. It was true. There was no garbage can in the art room. Ms. Hannah didn’t need a garbage can, because she never threw anything away. “That reminds me,” Ms. Hannah said. “For our next class, I would like you all to bring in things from home that your parents were planning to throw away.”
    â€œWhat for?”
    â€œSo we can make them into art.”
    I was still looking around for a garbage can. She had to have a garbage can somewhere . Everybody needs a garbage can.
    â€œIt’s a shame when people throw thingsaway,” Ms. Hannah said. “Everything in the world is beautiful. Everything can be used to make some kind of art.”
    â€œWell, I just blew my nose,” I said, holding out a tissue. “Does that make my boogers artistic?” Everybody laughed even though I didn’t say anything funny. Ms. Hannah took my tissue and stuck it to her big newspaper ball.
    It was disgusting.

3
Weird People
    In the lunchroom I got to sit next to Ryan and Michael. I gave my apple to Ryan, and he gave me his yogurt with sprinkles in it.
    â€œMs. Hannah is weird,” I said.
    â€œArtists are always weird,” Ryan said. “My mom has a friend who’s an artist,and she’s really weird. My mom says that’s because artists are creative.”
    â€œYour mom is weird,” Michael said.
    â€œLots of people are weird,” I told them. “That doesn’t make them creative. Some people are just weird, and they’re not creative at all. And some people are creative, and they’re not at all weird.”

    â€œYou’re weird, A.J.,” Ryan said.
    â€œAnybody who wears a dress made of pot holders is weird,” Michael said.
    â€œArt teachers are supposed to dress funny,” I said.
    â€œIf my dad dressed like that, he’d be fired,” Ryan