“Sticks and stones may
break my bones, but
names will never hurt
me.”
I heard this ditty so
much while I was grow
ing up. And, name calling
does hurt!
Kids used to call me
Wiggle Worm. It made
me feel so inferior when
I heard my peers call me
that name. It was years
- I mean years - before
I could tell anyone my
maiden name. Now, I am
proud of it because my
name is part of me.
I guess most kids do not
like their name at some
point. Even my grand
daughter didn’t like her
name. But I can remem
ber the pride when her
parents decided to call
their long-awaited baby
Morgan Alyse.
I never liked my first
name either. My parents
likely thought it was so
noble to call me Marie af
ter one of the Dione Quin
tuplets born in Canada in
1943. Why couldn’t they
have called me Yvonne
or Annette or Cecile orEmelie? Those are all cute names. Then I found out the meaning of my name - Living Fragrance. It gave me something to live up to, that I’d be sweet smelling and not a stink.
In the paper we see names that are strange.
General Petraeus was made fun of and called “betray us” in national papers. Just recently, a woman whose first name was Fairy was written about. What a handle to have to carry around!
And what about the person whose last name was Hooker?
I once asked a man whose name was Turnipseed if others made fun of his name. He said, “Of course.”
A friend told me her husband was always called Sheep because his name was Lambe. She also told of a boy in her class at school whose last name was Bass. He was called Flying Fish because of his loping walk.
When our boys were born, I wanted them tohave names that were simple and couldn’t be changed. So we named them Danny and Billy (short for William, wouldn’t you know?) But when they got older, they wanted to drop the “y” off the end.
One day we were visiting a cemetery where many of Jerry’s family were buried.
We came across a tombstone of his grandmother Teresa. I knew when I saw it that I’d name my first daughter after her. I didn’t want her to be called Terry or Trish, or any other form of Teresa.
Another grandmother was named Zulima. I thought that was such a lovely name and I wanted to give that name to my next child. I guess it’s good that we stopped with Teresa.
In looking through genealogy, there are many names that are seldom used today - Henry, Rueben, Reding, Augustus, Zachariah, Sibyl, Lucinda, Minerva, Cora, Etta.
Mothers often do not give their babies one of the old names.
I guess most of us have not liked our name at some time. But name calling is sort of like bullying.
And, yes, it does hurt!
Marie Putman, one-time Gravette resident, shares her thoughts with our readers twice every month.
Opinion, Pages 6 on 09/29/2010