Recently, an article came up in my newsfeed about a man who looked very similar to the famous actor Tom Cruise. He looked so much like him that sometimes it was difficult for him to leave his house. Photographers and fans would follow him around—shoving pens and notebooks at him for autographs. Classmates routinely marveled at the resemblance. This guy started to believe that maybe he could be a famous actor, too. The thing was, he wanted to be famous as himself.
Names are important.
Naming things—it’s my thing. As I’ve told you before, I named my car Georgia, my Roomba Ritchie, and my favorite office plant Sally. A lot of thought went into each name, and each name has significance; no other name would do. Some people, like my husband, argue that naming inanimate objects is silly. I think he may have even said, “It’s one step closer to robots taking over the world.” Maybe he’s right. Maybe I don’t need to name everything.
But then we got a new puppy.
One of the first things we needed to do was come up with a name. At this point, my husband reminded me, “You’re not a dog person,” which is ridiculous. I presented him with this new puppy for our anniversary! But since I was the one who gave him the gift, I also had to give up the naming rights . . . a very hard thing for me to do.
A list was created, discussions took place, and then he announced . . . Panzer. Our new puppy was going to be named Panzer—after the WWII German tank. My husband is a big history buff. He went into a long story of why his name choice was perfect. What I got out of it was that he selected a very masculine name for our growing puppy. Humph!
And then it happened . . . almost right away, Panzer was shortened to Panzie—not exactly a masculine equivalent.
Okay, now let me back up a little. For many years, we only had female dogs. Our current dog, Jade, has a feminine name that our daughter gave her. So, we have two dogs now, both with strong names. Until each name was turned into a nickname. Jade became Jadey, which sounds like J.D. when said aloud—a masculine name for our female dog. Add to that, Panzie, a feminine name for our masculine dog, and I’m losing my mind!
I’ll bet you can just picture our trips to the dog park. We enter the park and remove the leashes and call out, “Come on, Jadey,” and hear the first comment from the other park people: “What a nice-looking boy.” And then it happens AGAIN when my husband calls, “Come on, Panzie,” and the reply, “What a cute girl.”
The first couple of times, I went into a long explanation of, “No, No, No. J.D. is actually short for Jade; she’s our cute girl.” And “Panzie is short for Panzer; he’s our growing boy.”
Nobody cares.
It drives me CRAZY when people call my dogs by the wrong pronouns. And by people, I mean my husband. He confuses the two all the time.
Watching the puppy is the new pastime at our house. We sit on the couch and watch him play. Just like we did with the children. Then, it starts. My husband will comment, “She’s so clumsy,” or “She’s so cute.”
AAARGH!
He knows darn well. Panzer is a boy—he named him! Then Jade will enter the play circle, and my husband will say, “He’s not sure what to do with the puppy.” I can only take it for so long before I correct him, repeatedly, which has no lasting results.
He replies with a shrug, “Relax, what’s in a name?”