This seems to be a topic that comes up often– a conversation about names will trigger the thought, and I will ponder and wonder for the next while. There was a couple of things that happened this past week that spawned the thought–one during the ceremony of University convocation.  Perhaps it is all the pomp and ceremony, but I listened as each graduand crossed the stage, glancing at their names printed in the program. I wonder why some people have several middle names.  I wonder what the country of origin is of some of the surnames.  I wonder what initials stand for, and why they are abbreviated in some cases.

Then there was a blessing, a prayer and a welcome from members of a local First Nation.  In turn, as they introduced themselves, they gave their traditional Coast Salish name, and then their Anglicized name. Except that is not the term they used.  They referred to “my borrowed name”.  As if they had borrowed a name from another culture. I thought what a polite, even undeservedly respectful, way that was to refer to names that weren’t so much gifts as conveniences.

And that made me think of how a nick name is a borrowed name, and how to “nick” something in England is to “borrow”…. without asking.

It was in this circuitous fancy that I came to thinking of nicknames again. How I cherish the nicknames I have received over the years.  Some have stuck.  Some were just borrowed for a time.  A rose by any other name, and all that….

• Little Bear
• Boof
• Puck
• Leese
• Reader
• Bruce
• Nooks
• Minx
• Sparky
• Picante
• Fiddy
• Mumwoi
• Doge

And I suppose a modest collection of the usual terms of endearment, but those seem double-borrowed. Right, honey?

Addendum: It occurs to me that I nick-name my cars too:

• The Racer
• Mr. Monte
• Blacky
• Bluey/Hot Daniel
• Blanco
• The President.