Tuesday, May 1, 2007

Pour Myself a Cup of Ambition

Some of my students are reading The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri for their choice text. I love this book, and I recommend it to all. Anyway, because the kid in the book has a problem with his name, the group was talking about the names they would choose for their own future children.

“Hey, Ms. W.,” said one, “does, like, having students influence your choice of names? Like, if you had a kid in class, does that make you not want to pick that name?”

“Well,” I said, deciding to be honest, “I guess if it’s been a particularly difficult student, I might not pick the name.”

“Are there any names you definitely wouldn’t choose?” someone asked.

“Any names that rhyme with swear words are out,” I said definitively, thinking of Dan’s enthusiasm for the name Tucker. As a former middle school teacher, there’s no freaking way I could abide that.

Landon, a cheerful soph with an optimistic outlook, said, “So, if ‘Landon’ were on your list of choices, would having me in your life make you more likely to choose the name or less likely?”

“Definitely more likely,” I said, nodding, which was really the only right answer.

3 comments:

LH said...

there's a good sandra cisneros short piece on names.

we read it this year and wrote about our names.
the pieces were pretty good.

i really don't feel parents take naming as seriously as they should. some of the names of the kids at my school make me cringe. come on people!

trulybrilliant109 said...

I've read that Cisneros piece. It's nice. I highly recommend a good, sturdy name for anyone who might be pregnant (yet another hint for Cyndy): James. It's perfect to work all around -- Jimmy when young, Jim as older, James for formal use. See it's perfect. Not many little bastards at school named that anymore either. That always helps. Either that or you could join the bandwagon and name a baby Jacob or Emily or Ashley. Man, I sure haven't graded enough papers with those names on them ...

Ann said...

I was just telling someone about this book - they have a little one named Nikhil. I enjoyed that book.

On the naming front, we have 6 weeks (or less) and counting, and I am not happy with our name selection but have no other ideas.