A Lentilina By Any Other Name
When Linda and I first discovered we were healthily pregnant the sonogram technician described our budding baby girl as approximating the size of a lentil bean. I'm sure it was the 400th time she had made that comparison that day. Linda and I immediately code-named our baby "Project Lentil". I'm sure it was the 400th time that week that a set of new parents-to-be had applied such a moniker.
What I think may differentiate ourselves from these other parents in the manner in which this nickname has stuck over the months. When we found out that we were having a baby girl, she was quickly renamed "Lentilina". I think it is a fine name. Very unique, and one which may spur a whole new category of legume-inspired labels. Linda, however, is decidedly anti-vegetable when naming our children.
Unfortunately, this nickname, though transient, has made us feel we have already named our child. With three months to go we have not named our child! What is an expecting parent to do? Go out and buy The Big Book of 100,000 Baby Names. We went through them, highlighting promising possibilities, until we had whittled this monstrous list down to a promising 28. It was arduous bathroom-reading work (and I promise not to relate to my baby the circumstances under which her name was first considered).
But... 28... that is still a fairly large number! Fortunately, this book of 100,000 names had a sheet for rating a name. We took it, photocopied it, and got to work:
Each name was rated in a variety of categories: spellability, pronouncability, meaning, impression, nicknames, fit with last name, uniqueness, popularity, look of initials, gender clarity, etc... a veritable smorgasbord for the anally retentive and obsessive compulsive. I was in child-naming heaven.
One thing I found out quickly was how important it was to not give your child a name with nicknames easily mangled on the playground. Howso? Some examples, if you will:
Samantha sounds like a very pretty name, with good connotation and easy spellability. But what if our little girl is not very pretty? Would her playground nickname be mantha? For some reason, this gives me the impression of some raw-meat eating beast, not a beautiful little girl.
Vanessa! A good name in most accounts. But what if our little girl has a weight problem? Do we really want her to be known as van through her educational career? You know this would, eventually, morph to truck
Similarly, would dear, sweet, morbidly obese Isabella be happy to be nicknamed portabello during these formitive years?
And short Sarah has almost no nickname at all. At 11pm last night all we could muster was ah which, when spoken correctly, is horribly insulting.
And thus four names were removed from consideration partly to protect our daughter from playground bullies and partly to protect our daughter from me who, having thought of these names, would no doubt use them despite my best efforts to the contrary.
It is, however, my fervent wish that Lentilina befriends a Vanessa, an Isabella, a Samantha, and a Sarah....
Lentilina Hey dad, can Sam, Vanessa, Isi, and Sarah come over?
Ed: Well, before Mantha comes over again let me go to the store and pick up some red meat. And hide the cats this time, we almost lost Chester.
Lentilina Daddy!
Ed: And you tell Truck and Portabello to stop leaving chew dents in the cutlery.
Lentilina Daddy!!
Ed: Ok. fine. But I'm not picking up "uuhh", she needs to get dropped off.
Lentilina Daddy!!!
-Ed
ps. My deepest apologies to all overweight children. I was no rail growing up* either.
*and by "growing up" I mean until I was 30 years old.
What I think may differentiate ourselves from these other parents in the manner in which this nickname has stuck over the months. When we found out that we were having a baby girl, she was quickly renamed "Lentilina". I think it is a fine name. Very unique, and one which may spur a whole new category of legume-inspired labels. Linda, however, is decidedly anti-vegetable when naming our children.
Unfortunately, this nickname, though transient, has made us feel we have already named our child. With three months to go we have not named our child! What is an expecting parent to do? Go out and buy The Big Book of 100,000 Baby Names. We went through them, highlighting promising possibilities, until we had whittled this monstrous list down to a promising 28. It was arduous bathroom-reading work (and I promise not to relate to my baby the circumstances under which her name was first considered).
But... 28... that is still a fairly large number! Fortunately, this book of 100,000 names had a sheet for rating a name. We took it, photocopied it, and got to work:
Each name was rated in a variety of categories: spellability, pronouncability, meaning, impression, nicknames, fit with last name, uniqueness, popularity, look of initials, gender clarity, etc... a veritable smorgasbord for the anally retentive and obsessive compulsive. I was in child-naming heaven.
One thing I found out quickly was how important it was to not give your child a name with nicknames easily mangled on the playground. Howso? Some examples, if you will:
Samantha sounds like a very pretty name, with good connotation and easy spellability. But what if our little girl is not very pretty? Would her playground nickname be mantha? For some reason, this gives me the impression of some raw-meat eating beast, not a beautiful little girl.
Vanessa! A good name in most accounts. But what if our little girl has a weight problem? Do we really want her to be known as van through her educational career? You know this would, eventually, morph to truck
Similarly, would dear, sweet, morbidly obese Isabella be happy to be nicknamed portabello during these formitive years?
And short Sarah has almost no nickname at all. At 11pm last night all we could muster was ah which, when spoken correctly, is horribly insulting.
And thus four names were removed from consideration partly to protect our daughter from playground bullies and partly to protect our daughter from me who, having thought of these names, would no doubt use them despite my best efforts to the contrary.
It is, however, my fervent wish that Lentilina befriends a Vanessa, an Isabella, a Samantha, and a Sarah....
Lentilina Hey dad, can Sam, Vanessa, Isi, and Sarah come over?
Ed: Well, before Mantha comes over again let me go to the store and pick up some red meat. And hide the cats this time, we almost lost Chester.
Lentilina Daddy!
Ed: And you tell Truck and Portabello to stop leaving chew dents in the cutlery.
Lentilina Daddy!!
Ed: Ok. fine. But I'm not picking up "uuhh", she needs to get dropped off.
Lentilina Daddy!!!
-Ed
ps. My deepest apologies to all overweight children. I was no rail growing up* either.
*and by "growing up" I mean until I was 30 years old.
posted by Ed at 12:56 PM
2 Comments:
Ed,
I adore your humor and wit in your writings. It's so... sweet. ;) Seriously though, you always managed to bring a smile to my face, or cause me to laugh out loud, and when hub's home and I do this, he's got to see what you've written. (I'm still cracking up about the CPR class...)
The entire naming process is interesting in the way each parent decides what to name his or her child. For us, it was easy. We knew the name of both our kids (we only have one now, but are planning on another eventually) since hubby and I were dating.
Another friend of mine, didn't decide on a name until after she was holding her sweet little girl in her arms, and, dare I say her name is Sarah.
My one friend totally thought she was going to have a girl, only to have a boy, and took a week to think of a name.
Another friend couldn't think or settle on any names until almost two weeks after the birth.
Did I also mention, my cousin's daughter is named Samantha. :) And, my other cousin is married to an Isabella. Alas, I don't know a Vanessa... probably a good thing, as, that would just be way too freaky.
Stacie,
We have yet to pick a name. I scored all 28 and Linda is scoring her 28, then we will collect our top 5 and see how we compared. Then, I imagine, there will be a second round of matching with potential middle names. I'm working on the differential equations as we speak.
Grace,
Thank you! Humor is how I handle most things in my life and knowing it provoked a few laughs warms my heart. All of these names are good ones, and all have foibles. Heck, mine means "past tense" (or a medical condition requiring viagra).
-Ed
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