A Name, Is a Name, Is a Name or is It?

Have you ever wondered what’s in a name? Or do names just pass you by as if they are part of the wallpaper? I am the wall paper type …well up until just a few minutes ago when the thought about names came to me. I was just looking about the room and it dawned on me that everything in the room, outside the windows and into the world has a name. And that brought back the memory of my husband (at the time boyfriend) commenting why I gave everything he gave me a name.

Well I did not have an answer for him and I may not have an answer for you either as to why but the most sense it makes is so that we as humans can distinguish between things, people and places. All nouns have names. What brought about the smile to my face was the thought of Dr. Seuss’s Thing 1 and Thing 2 from The Cat in the Hat. The name of no name, the name that just came the name that was just given to a pair just like that. Sorry I can get carried away. But to understand a name is to understand its origin and the meaning behind it.

If we look at a baby name book we can find all the meanings of the most commons names. Elizabeth - next to God, Michael – who is like God etc. You get the idea. These being of course Christian examples. If we investigate other cultures and names we may find people have given a name not for what it means but given a name to match the spirit of the child, to match the personality. This is how many from our native North American culture have been named or have given names. I so love the idea of being named after truly who I am. Funny though, I may have gone my whole life without as I still feeling I am not fully there yet.

But we subdivide into multiple levels of names. Roses are all roses but then there are many different varieties such as tea roses and climbing roses and long stem and then in that we even give names to the more divided grouping to become the individual such as Woman, Martha Washington, Empress of the Garden and so on and so forth. But still what is in that name? Why do we name everything?

Can you imagine if we did not? What would our communication look like? It might be just a jumble of gestures, or a fragment of speech, even a disconnected gathering of both but would we be able to communicate our wants need and desires (that are even labeled and named), would we be like we are now? We freely communicate using words and body language and in those communications we use names to label what we are describing or what we have done or where we have been and who we have been with. Now back to Thing 1 and Thing 2, what if they have been given different names? What if they were the same but not called who they are? Would the story still be the same for us? I would think not for me any ways as I have an expectation from Seuss that leads me to believe I am going to hear crazy names and tongue twisting poetry that will make all ages giggle. So let’s look at something a little more complex. Toes…..that’s right our toes. They are named a simple and easily said word. It is not a proper noun so it get no special attention like capitalization in a sentence it is just toes. A word we have come to accept as the name for this body part. We all have them in some form or the other to some degree so we just accept that a toe is a toe is a foot with toes. But here is the twist, what if our toes, were in fact, not named toes but the name kumquats was given to them instead? Would we be laughing at such a great name for a body part or would we just accept the name for what it is….the name of a body part and give it respect?

As my children giggle behind me reading over my shoulder, giggling at my rhyming Seuss and me renaming toes to a fruit I come to the conclusion that names matter. They matter as a simple word that delineates a part of something to a name that is given to the grandest thing on the planet…a baby….life….the world…so the next time you use words please choose them wisely and give a small thought to the origin and to why something was named that name.  

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Autumn and the Glory of Just Outside Your Window

 

Well after ignoring the fact that I am a writer for almost four months I can say I am back. I have had the worst case of writer’s block you could imagine. But not only that I have had nothing to rant about. After we left our former dance studio and made the move to a more positive and honest studio atmosphere the desire to be negative and rant left me. I felt as if the clouds of doom had been lifted and we were free. So that left a void of the rant…it was gone but not forgotten. So today I thought I would bring some positive thoughts and images to your mind.

 

I rarely describe where I write as I like to be very private but the scene outside my window today is stunning. I write on the upper floor of our home and can see most of our back yard. The edges of the yard are lined with trees each one different. A red maple in the back far corner as the fence becomes irregular and juts into the neighbouring yard. We are flanked by six other properties as the shape of the yard is odd and long but wide in some places and then folds it’s way to the back where it become bent into a smaller version of itself. The Harlequin maple has dropped all of its leaves and sits waiting for winter to blast its way through and line the branches with snow. This is a majestic tree in the spring and summer. The leaves are a soft green in the centre and then a gentle green yellow towards the outside and the branches are overly full of leaves by the late spring. This tree fill up with so many leaves it looks as if it might topple over from the weight above, but it never has and it stands beautiful every year.

Between these two maple trees is a sugar maple. It has died but not quite. There is a very small amount of green leaves still clinging to it last branches. Sadly, it will need to be removed soon. The beech tree and the other tree that will remain unnamed, as I have no idea what variety it is, are still covered in leaves. The beech tree has not even turned yellow yet. The leaves still cling a brilliant green and rustle in the wind attached as if they will remain for the winter. The unknown tree has turned yellow. A bright and glowing colour that covers the branches with a silhouette of fall and the beauty I see from my window.

The grass remains green and scattered with fallen leaves of many colours and crinkled shapes. The vegetable garden is empty but for the last few pepper plants gaining the last rays of sunshine from the days ahead. Their green presence a reminder of the summer just past. The perennial spices remain too. Sage, thyme, mint, chocolate mint, lovage and rosemary all linger in the cooling weather and ready themselves for the long sleep ahead. I will see you all in the spring as you poke your heads up from your sleep. Thank you for your harvest gifts this year, we are grateful. I could almost smell each one of them in turn as I wrote their names.

 

The glow of the late morning sun sitting low on the horizon brings thoughts of the cold winter days ahead that will set before they awake. The short days that bring the sleep to the world and the refreshing of the land and lakes to come as they sleep alongside and protect the animals that rest over the cold months. But just before that the few days of glory, the days of the bright colours that decorate our landscape just outside our windows.

 

The dance of the leaves as they fall and swirl in the air plucked by the wind and laid down to rest of the soft grass. These leaves coloured so bright in the sun and the dull grey of a cloudy day bring beauty to a time before the cycle of the night. Before me through my window is a large maple coloured in orange as intense as the sun itself giving off the allure of heat it almost tricks the mind into believing there could be warmth there near it. White clouds in the distance give a definition to the depth of the colour and make seem as if it is brighter, more brilliant, more striking. All the while knowing the chill in the air is there and the smell of autumn has arrived as I look out my window to write.

 

All Photos By: Lisa Anne

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