Nicknames are bizarre. They're rarely ever thought through but rather appear one day on the tongue for no apparent reason and stick from that day forward. It happens regarding humans, furry creatures, babies, automobiles, etc.
I've known since the day I moved in that my labrador roommates' names were Boomer and Scout respectively. Yet somehow, and I'm not even sure when it began, I've taken to calling them Boomsy-pop and Scoutness. It sounds like a throwback band from the eighties, for crying out loud, but one day, there it was, and now forever after, that's what pops into my head when graced with their limpid brown eyes and abnormally large wagging tails. "Boomsy-pop!" "Scoutness!" It's like we were all born with a gene which, about the fifth time we lay eyes on something, causes a random descriptive word to emerge in our thoughts and burst forth in speech. For those of us with unfortunate nicknames from high school, this is a phenomenon with which we are overly familiar. I believe it began with Adam, chilling in the Garden of Eden, when all of the sudden, a small, feathered creature came shooting out of the trees, fluttering its wings in flight and Adam shouted, "Bird!" (or whatever the Hebrew/Aramaic equivalent). It's a good thing I wasn't tasked with naming the creatures roaming the planet, otherwise children the nation over would be learning about Wingednesses and Elepops. What? I think it gives them character.
No comments:
Post a Comment