Sunday, August 31, 2014

Turkey Boy St Nicholas

The bun in my oven still remains nameless.

He is constantly referred to as Turkey Boy, much to my mother's chagrin.  She keeps insisting we need to find a real name lest he be made fun of for the rest of his life.  I keep insisting "Turkey Boy" might be the cutest nickname I have ever heard of; the fact that Lydia named him this makes for an even better story and memory!

Jeremy and I have come up with a handful of first and middle name combinations we both like but I, myself, can't seem to bring myself to say THATS THE ONE!  Each name has meaning and a thoughtfulness behind it.  I can't seem to drop one over the other.  I'm beginning to wonder if only royalty can use three middle names.
 
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Simon

We once knew this man named Simon, many years ago.  He was a really, really good friend of ours.  Jeremy and he were both in A School together when they first joined the Navy.  We stayed in touch and even, somehow being on different boats, managed to follow each other from state to state for many years. 

I remember when Jeremy was on his first deployment and I was pregnant with Kyra, Simon would come over to our house just to hang out with me or take me out for supper.  As painfully shy as I was, he was the only friend I knew in town and I cherished his kindness. 

I remember when he first held Kyra.  She a baby whose age was still being counted by weeks and, once again, Jeremy was out to sea.  I was lonely and in need of company and Simon was almost magnetically drawn to my front door when I needed a friend the most.

He sat in our recliner, balancing this tiny thing in his lap, clearly a foreign object to him.  I cooed to my infant that this was her Uncle Simon who does stupid things like jump out of perfectly good airplanes for fun, and he bounced her lightly until she spit up on him and started crying. 

We've lost touch over the years.  Last we spoke with him, I was pregnant with Lydia and we had all, somehow, managed to move to yet another state and lived not terribly far from each other.  We made plans to get together for supper and then I got sick.  A cold, virus or what have you, plans were cancelled and we haven't seen Simon since, other than on Facebook for the short period I was on it.

Jude

St Simon and St Jude share a feast day together.  It happens to be 6 days before my due date.  If plans work out the way I want them to, I will be on an operating room table waiting to hear the first cries from my baby boy on that feast day. 

Jeremy has brought up the name Jude both when I was pregnant with Lydia and Ruby as a possible boys name.  I rejected it both times for no other reason than I liked it for other people's children, just not my own. 

Until I find out the feast day coincidence.  Suddenly I like it.  A lot.

Ruby has an obsession with Jeremy, right now.  He is her version of Santa Clause every evening when he walks through the door and nothing could light up her day better or faster than Jeremy's sudden appearance.  Except for the little boy across the street.  To everyone else he is Joseph, or Joe.  To Ruby he is JOJO!  JOJO!  JOJO!  JOJO!  JoJo is the only one to rival the excitement my dear Ruby reserves only for her father. 

One morning we were sitting in the front pews of the church when Ruby spotted Joseph walking through the doors in the back.  Excitement abound, JOJO! had just entered the room.  And then it hit me, all those prayers for a sign, what in the world should I call my new boy....

If Ruby gets this excited over Jeremy and JoJo, maybe she'll get equally as excited for Jude.  After all, they all start with 'J'.  Maybe this was confirmation why I am suddenly drawn to the name Jude? 

{I never said my reasoning's were sane...}

Nicholas

Baby boy will forever be referred to as Turkey Boy.  Its a name that even friends are referring to him as with a smile and air of fondness.

Kyra came up with St Nicholas, wanting to honor good old Santa Clause himself, but the name has all but been dropped as a nickname.  I feel guilty for it, too.  Probably an overly emotional pregnancy guilt, but I feel like Lydia's name choice will be used for years to come while Kyra's will be forgotten. 

I like Nicholas.  Mostly as a middle name.  It's been on my radar for all three of my children.  It also probably doesn't hurt that one of my favorite uncles is a Nicholas.  Clearly I'm drawn to names that associate with good people.

Lucas

Jeremy has thrown the name Luke out for several of our children.  Its another name I've rejected over the years.  Until the name Jude came to the forefront of my brain, one Sunday...

Jude is the patron saint of lost and hopeless causes...

Luke is the patron saint of doctors....

It wouldn't be so bad if maybe we had a doctor in the family.  One that took on the really difficult cases.  And who knows, maybe a name can influence the profession...?

Still, Luke is too short of a name to go with Jude, isn't it?  Maybe we could go with Lucas, instead?

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Simon Jude- Amazing friend; a shared feast day.
Jude Simon- A 'J' name for the Ruby; a shared feast day.
Jude Nicholas- A 'J' name for the Ruby; a name picked by my Kyra Shea
Jude Lucas- A doctor in the family

Jeremy says he likes all of them, but his favorites are Simon Jude and Jude Lucas. 

I  am equally torn between all 4 of the name combinations and, in my hormonal state, keep trying to attach meaning to the name even though my other children's names were picked simply because we liked them.  Meaning played little influence. 

But for this child. 

Probably our last child. 

Naming him a name that carries weight seems to be important to me, which only makes it harder to choose.

At this point Jeremy would probably agree to the name Peter Pollywog.  He'd just like to have a name so people will quit asking him what are we going to call our child.  Meaning means very little to him.  He's sticking with our original plan of,  Do we like it?  Works for me, here's the name.

Two months to go.  Two more months to hem and haw.  Two more months to drive my husband nuts.

Maybe we should just stick to Turkey Boy St Nicholas.  Everyone seems to like it... except my mother.  :-)

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