What’s in a name? A
lot. It’s the first gift a parent gives
their child, so it better be good.
Play along with me here.
If you heard the name Milo Horndecker, what image comes to your
mind? A nerd-geek of the first degree,
right? Well, maybe Milo looks like
Matthew McConaughey! Don’t judge.
Or if you heard the name Adonis Constantinople…you think Greek god
right? But maybe there is your
nerd-geek.
Take myself, f’rinstance.
During the five months I was in foster care after birth, I was Beverly. When I was adopted, I got a whole brand new
birth certificate that says Judith Kay.
Side note here…there is only one
person on this planet besides my mother who can call me that. Anybody else who uses that name gets The Look
and probably a smack in the face. Just
saying.
I’m going to break the rule I have about only using
nicknames here and use real names because the story can’t be told otherwise,
and it’s a story worth telling.
Captain and I made a deal when we were pregnant the first
time. He got to pick the boy name and I
could pick the girl name.
Anyway, for our first pregnancy, Captain picked Reginald
Patrick for a boy name. I was a little
surprised because that isn’t exactly a common Upper Midwest name. His reasoning was that if this boy wanted to
be a doctor, lawyer, stock broker, etc., Reginald was a good and powerful name
for that. If, on the other hand, he
wanted to be a farmer, trucker, welder, or mechanic then Reggie was a good name
for that. Patrick was a given in order
to honor Captain’s brother. I find it
extremely interesting that I had Shannon picked as a first name at that
time…Shannon Patricia. On a side note,
Captain’s mom had also picked Shannon for a girl name when she was pregnant
with their first child. With Reggie’s
daughter named Shannon, I have to assume that the cosmic universe felt Shannon
was a good Brogan name.
When Brogan Baby #1 came along, we were happy to name him
Reginald Patrick, and he does go by Reggie.
Unless he is in trouble and his mother is middle-naming him!
When we were pregnant the second time, it was my turn to
pick the boy name and Captain got to pick the girl name. He didn’t spend a lot of time on it…as in
none…for a couple of reasons. Girls
weren’t common in the family at that time, plus the ultrasound tech blurted out
that it was a boy before we could say we didn’t want to know. So now it was ALL my decision. Whoop, whoop!
I will confess that I had a couple of missteps in the name
picking department. I really like the
name Logan and was trying to convince Captain about it. He just looked at me and said, “Wait for
it.” Ten seconds later the light bulb
went on that the poor child would be Logan Brogan. Not cool.
Fine. Plan B was Cody
Michael. We were both good with that.
Imagine our surprise when Baby Brogan #2 arrived and was
announced as a girl. Now what?! We had no name picked out and all
clothing/décor was the wrong color!
There went all my thought and consideration for names and now Captain was
up to bat. He looked at her for a minute
and said, “She looks like a Mary Ann.
Okay, I’m going back home to do chores now.”
Okay, that was a fine name, and I went with it.
Fast forward three years to preschool registration and all
those forms you have to fill out. Captain
was sitting with me at the table as I filled out paper after paper.
First
name: Mary. Middle name:
Ann. Last name: Brogan.
Captain
looks at me and says, “That’s not right.”
Yes
it is, dude. No, it’s not. Yes, it is.
Back and forth. I finally dragged
out her birth certificate that I had filled out at the hospital. First name:
Mary. Middle name: Ann.
Last name: Brogan. See…I am right and you are wrong.
He
growled at me and said, “That’s not what I meant! Her name is supposed to be MaryAnn, no middle
name, Brogan.” Well, buddy boy, maybe if
you hadn’t ditched me at the hospital to go do chores, we could have hashed
this out three years ago! To be honest,
I call her Molly anyway. None of us,
just for reference, have ever called her Princess as a nickname, so from now on
in this blog, she will be Molly. Make
note so you don’t get confused.
Even
though I did not get to name either one of the children, I think their names
fit their personalities just fine. Good
job, Captain!
