I'm 43 years old and got to thinking that people have given me a lot of nicknames over the years:

Sunshine
Squirt
Popsqually
Mishelady
Snickle fritz
Pumpkin Head
Buckwheat
Shelly
Shell
Chief
Boss Lady
Mimi
Honey
Baby
Sweetie

Everyone of these names are dear to me as are the people who gave me the name.

It's funny, my given name is Michelle and I never liked it to much cuz I have trouble pronouncing "l"s. I also have trouble with "r" and "w"....it's not really a lisp...when I was in third grade, my elementary school sent in a "specialist" for a few days to work with me but the decided I'd just grow out of it. I never really did, but, who cares. Why is it such a big deal how people pronounce things. There's so many languages, dialects, styles, etc., that it would be ashame to homogenize it all. It would be like music with only one note....blah.

The name "michelle" is after arch angle Michael. I really don't want to be an arch angel....it's just too much work. I'd rather be named after a new age comedian (wanda sykes,whoopi goldberg, dharma on dharma and greg, phoebe on friends) or someone "softer" or someone holy (abraham's wife sara) or after some type of fanatasy character (sirens, fairies, dragons, spirits....)

Oh well maybe I'll change my name someday, or maybe someone will give me that "perfect" nickname.

So...what's in a name? Do you know what your name means? Do you know the geneology of your name...the country...the people...the history...the culture...the promises....do you?

My Tahoe truck's name is Emily. It means "hardworking" - she's HIGH maintenance and tempermental but she's been my favorite car. The car before that was a Chevy Blazer name Barney (no it was NOT purple) - he was reliable, loyal, dependable, friendly, low maintenance, and still runs on love after 370,000 miles - I gave Barney to Russell because noone else would take him. I didn't want to give him to a stranger. My first car was Buffy, she was peppy, full of teenage glee, easy to clean and repair myself, had numerous dings/dents from "new driver" lessons, but most importantly, she had some of the funnest memories (girlfriends, boyfriends, beaches, camping trips, fishing trips, high school, college, movies, country dancing, day dreaming about the future and all the possibilities that layed ahead.

You know, I read an article that when people name their cars, the cars live longer...honestly I'm not making this up. The study wasn't sure as to why this phenomena occured but they figured it was just that the owners took better care of the car when it was named. I did think that's the only reason...I think everything lives better when it's named and loved.....people do.

Your thoughts???