Posts from — September 2009

Baby Smiling in Back Seat has had two Thoughtful Thursdays recently that asked about baby names. In the first, she asked when people chose baby names and in the second, she asked about people scooping your chosen names.

I was about to answer this in her comment section, but it sort of deserved a larger space to stretch out. The fact is, I started thinking about names back when I was in college. I went to a lecture about naming children given by an Israeli professor and the gist of the lecture was that names originally reflected a person’s culture and language and that we shouldn’t do away with cultural names in order to blend with one another within America. The other idea is that children should only have one name–it can be in many parts (first name, middle name, last name), but a single name to be used in all places.

Which feels like a no-brainer to some, but American Jews are notorious for giving an English name to be used in day-to-day life and a Hebrew name to be used for religious purposes. And listening to that lecture, I decided that when I grew up, I would give my children one name; a Hebrew name that was accessible to non-Hebrew speakers. So they could have sort of the best of all worlds–a name that merged with the surrounding American culture that was a single name known in Israel too. It sort of narrowed down the list for us.

But there were more requirements: We paid close attention to the meaning of the names because I wanted the names to become a phrase when you put their full name together. And I wanted them to bring in elements of different stories connected to the people we wanted to honour. So their names are these complex weaving of stories and nouns and ideas that connect us to people in our family.

I came up with the Wolvog’s name when I was closing a suitcase. We had been trying to conceive, but didn’t know we were infertile. I was zipping up the suitcase at Josh’s aunt’s house and I said his name aloud–the first and middle name–apropos of nothing. Josh sort of shrugged and agreed it was a pretty rockin’ name. The Wolvog also has a second middle name which we didn’t put on the birth certificate. It’s his secret name and it’s his choice whether or not to share it with people. The second middle name has a great story attached to it and we thought it sort of spiced up life to having this secret name, this trapdoor of a name, that only some people will ever know.

The ChickieNob had her first name long before she was conceived. We had a different name chosen for a bit, but it rhymed with the Wolvog’s name and once we found out we were having boy-girl twins and we’d have to use one name or the other, the Wolvog kept his name and we gave the ChickieNob the other contender which meant the same thing. The problem was that we didn’t have a middle name.

We threw out a lot of possibilities, but none of them felt right. So we went one night to a Borders and I told Josh that I was going to stand until we chose a name. I was pretty far along and standing was fairly uncomfortable so we moved quickly through the list, reading aloud every name possibility (we had a letter we wanted to work with) until at one point, I said her middle name and we both looked up at each other and said at the same moment, “that’s it!” and closed the book and sat down to have coffee.

And her middle name works perfectly with her first name to complete a phrase that also speaks to the birth order.

The ChickieNob also has a secret middle name; a second middle name. And she sometimes uses it and sometimes doesn’t and I guess it will always be interesting to me when I see who she has told and who she hasn’t.

All of this work to choose the most perfect names in the world and I never use them. We have gone through a boatload of nicknames–it sometimes changes daily. In fact, just this morning, Josh was called Carmine Fancypants for about ten minutes. I’m not sure why we never use their perfect, wonderful names except to say that nicknames hold an intimacy that given names do not (unless you have a secret trapdoor name like our kids). And the ChickieNob and I share a nickname that we both call each other which I feel marks her as mine and me as hers.

I have two names–my English name, Melissa–is used in most places. By which I mean that I usually go by Mel. But I also have a Hebrew name, though Josh is the only one who uses it anymore. In Hebrew, our letters also serve as numbers. Alef (the first letter) equals one. Bet (the second letter) equals two. This goes up to yood (the tenth letter) which equals ten, and then the numbers after that equal increments of 10 (20, 30, 40, 50…) until it reaches 100 and the last four numbers have a value of 100, 200, 300, and 400 (sofit letters can be used to go up to 900).

The idea of counting the numbers associated with your name is part of gematria. Which I’m not that into EXCEPT that my name literally has the most perfect value in the world. It is so perfect both in how the numbers fall and their total value that I always thought that I must be the most special girl in the world to have a name like that.

I really think my parents did it by accident–simply chose the name because they liked it and it honoured someone they loved–in the same way we chose the twins’ names. But that just makes it more magical–to have this perfect, symmetrical name which is so incredibly fitting because I need everything to be perfectly symmetrical in my life.

I like the name Melissa, and I am fond of how it shortens to Mel. But I absolutely love my Hebrew name and I would make it my only name except that it’s sort of my trapdoor name and I’m glad that it isn’t used by everyone. I sort of wonder if I’d love it as much as I do if I heard it every single day from everyone I encounter–from Josh to the grocery store cashier.

Strangely enough, I have never added up the gematria of the twins’ names. I simply don’t want to know.

How do you feel about your name? Do you love it? Hate it? Wish you could change it but feel too sentimental or worried that it would offend your parents? Have you changed your name? Only used a nickname? And if you chose a new name, how would you pick it?

This is a week that has been in my head for five years. We were told that by age five, the twins’ adjusted age should catch up with their actual age. Within five years, we wouldn’t see a difference between the Wolvog and ChickieNob and their full-term peers. Melissa of now says “bwaaaaah!” to that fact, noting that we still clap when they’re on the charts growth-wise at a doctor’s visit. They are small kids. You can tell they started out small and they’re still small. They are a very young five, developmentally. And that’s fine–I get babyhood that much longer. But the earnest Melissa of five years ago thought the whole world would look different on this date, when the two ages meshed and I thought prematurity would be chucked out the window.

Wasn’t that earnest Melissa so sweet? I just want to pinch her cheeks for a moment.

Of course, you can only have retrospect with time and the fact is that this date was the receptacle of my hope. I placed all my hope in it when footing felt off in the beginning. I knew there was an end in sight and while it may be far off, all would be okay at that point. Life doesn’t truly work like that and I think my head knew that. But like so many other places in my life, my heart has a louder voice. And I’m glad sometimes that it does because I needed to have that hope then, just as I need to just be in the moment now.

Lindsay and my mother came over and we all had milk and cookies to celebrate.

So happy Mesh Date, ChickieNob and Wolvog. May you always grow strong and healthy and may you always be yourselves and happy in your own skin.

Show and Tell is wasted on elementary schoolers. Join several dozen bloggers weekly to show off an item, tell a story, and get the attention of the class. In other words, this is Show and Tell 2.0. Everyone is welcome to join, even if you have never posted before and just found out about Show and Tell for the first time today. So yank out a photo of the worst bridesmaid’s dress you ever wore and tell us the story; show off the homemade soup you cooked last night; or tell us all about the scarf you made for your first knitting project. Details on how to participate are located at the bottom of this post.

Let’s begin.

I thought that I should do something profound because it is 09-09-09, perhaps show nine items that were important to me when I was nine-years-old…except this idea only occurred to me on Tuesday night. So I give you the fact that I relish both the best and worst of the Beatles. Meaning, I relish the best:

I love this photo because they are such BOYS–I mean, truly, such boys. And it captures this exuberance that makes your heart explode if you consider it for too long.

And I relish the worst–I mean, relish it, roll around in it, watch it numerous times:

And like a mother, I love it all equally–differently, but equally. I love Eddie Murphy as the Fifth Beatle and I love street musicians in Jerusalem playing “Let it Be” on violins (fourteen-years-old, Saturday night on Ben Yehuda street–I still remember those street musicians and drinking hot lemonade at Cafe Atara), and I love “Free as a Bird” even though few others do.

Across the Universe is the epitome of terrible/wonderful Beatles–it’s like Capri Sun. You know how as a kid you always wanted to have a Capri Sun in your lunch and then you’d get one for a special occasion and you’d drink it in one gulp and then you’d still be thirsty but endless happy? That’s what watching the movie is like–you literally don’t absorb it. You can watch it 14 times, play it in the background while you write Tash about the Beatles, and it literally doesn’t stick with you for longer than 5 minutes. I love it. Love it.

A few days ago, Lindsay and I were talking about which Beatle we align with the most, which is a more interesting game than which Hogwart house you’d be placed in. She is definitely Paul-like in personality (or what you imagine his personality to be since you only know the public figure). As much as I am attracted to Johns, I am definitely not a John myself. I am so clearly a George, which is also fitting since one of my top 5 Beatles songs is “The Inner Light” (other 4: And Your Bird Can Sing, Ob-la-di Ob-la-da, Here Comes the Sun, and Mother Nature’s Son).

Which Beatle are you most like? And if your personality doesn’t match with anyone in the band, what would you bring to the band personality-wise as the fifth Beatle?

What are you showing today?

Click here or scroll down to the bottom of this post if this is your first time joining along (Important: link to the permalink for the post, not the main url for your blog and use your blog’s name, not your name. Links not going to a Show and Tell post will be deleted). The list is open from now until late Friday night and a new one is posted every week.

We have a winner for the first round of Blogger Bingo (with an honourable mention to Once a Mother):

Last week, several posts on the greater meaning behind the words child-free or childless floated through the Internet, some said more eloquently than others. Some thought we shouldn’t have given attention to the original post but I can’t disagree more. When you observe something that bothers you and there is a point to addressing it (because you believe change can come out of addressing it), then the answer is not to squelch your feeling, but instead to utilize the best form you have of expressing yourself and examine your feelings on the subject.

There were posts and bulletin boards that went with pointless name-calling, but others who presented their personal reaction to the post as well as why they were upset by the words. The one that had the best discussion within the comment section appeared on BlogHer and I don’t think that was an accident despite the fact that it probably had the most diverse population reading the post than any other blog. We had a great discussion too, but many of us are coming from the same population, therefore, it didn’t surprise me that you felt similarly.

The comments on BlogHer were written by a broad audience of those with or without children and in both cases, due to a plethora of reasons ranging from choice to circumstance. There were differing opinions, though everyone stated their thoughts respectfully, taking into account the idea that everyone’s circumspection needs to extend as far as the next person reading their words. It can’t stop at a halfway point, only creating a bubble of thoughtfulness towards those like-minded. It needs to extend to every possible reader, who doesn’t need to agree, but needs to be able to walk away unoffended.

The original post that everyone used as a jumping point to their own words took the opposite approach, with the author stating within her apology “Did I know I’d get a rise out of people? Yes. And yes, I was taking a jab at the child-free.” The original post received over one hundred comments–an anomaly for the Orlando Sentinel blog posts which tend to get under 10 comments per post (and most receive one or none) and those comments were as vitriol-laced and angry as the original post.

And the obvious answer is that thoughtfulness begets thoughtfulness and thoughtlessness begets thoughtlessness. Laurie at BlogHer presented her reaction to the original post with thoughtful circumspection and in turn, commenters took her lead and added their own respectful ideas. Kim Hays wrote the original post trying to anger others and in turn, commenters came at her with anger. And it wasn’t just an angry reaction from the group she intended to hurt. Her anger created anger in others as her commenters took the lead of the writer and spoke with the same disrespectful tone with which she used on her potential readers.

The idea of how do we communicate what is important to us without offending others has come into discussion in regards to IComLeavWe. The project attracts a lot of infertility bloggers because it started within our community, but it has since expanded to include bloggers in all areas of the blogosphere and participation is open and encouraged for all regardless of blog topic. The very point is to open dialogue between communities.

Participants enter their blog on a list and describe their blog in three words to give readers a heads up before they click over. Participants then read and comment on a wide cross-section of blogs from adoption-focused to political-in-nature. And while the project celebrates the almighty comment and the interactive and conversational nature of blogging, it also is meant to mix people who might not otherwise meet. Think of it as an online version of the BlogHer conference, where you leave your corner of the blogosphere and meet hundreds of other types of blogger whose corners of the blogosphere might be wholly unfamiliar to you.

The point of IComLeavWe is not just to read about a life that might be incredibly different from your own with the person making very different life decisions, but to also respect and respond to their words. To not just read and click away, but to leave a comment. This works better, as you can imagine, sometimes more than others.

But how far can we take circumspection with a vast and varied Internet–especially within blogs where the writer usually doesn’t know all the readers who may encounter the post? The larger the audience–as is the case with a large readership such as BlogHer–the more chance there is to offend because the audience will not all be focused on the same like-minded topic as they do on smaller, themed blogs.

A lot can be learned by examining the two posts and learning not only how to be a better blog writer, but a better blog reader and commenter.

(1) Be concise and clear. The reader isn’t inside the author’s head and therefore if it’s not stated outright, the reader doesn’t know the information. Don’t assume your reader has read a post–link to it. Don’t assume they follow the same people on twitter. And don’t make the mistake the original author did when she aimed her post at everyone without children by using vague language. Her apology stated that she meant her original post to be directed at those who are child-free who have attacked her decision to have children. But in leaving her post as an open message to all people without children, she inadvertently hurt everyone who is not a parent. In fact, in her apology, she continues to state that “I (still) do believe that there are certain intangible benefits to being a parent that people without children will never be able to comprehend” still directing her message to all people without children rather than the ones she meant to target.

(2) Be polite. Keep the same level of politeness in the online world as you would in the face-to-face world. People can argue and disagree without being cruel. However you comport yourself as you move though your day extend to your interactions online. Before you hit publish on a post or comment, ask yourself if you would say the same things if you had to look the person in the face and speak the words.

(3) Give details. One of the inherent problems with the original article is that she states that she is responding to cruelty thrown her way without actually stating concrete situations that the reader can use as a lens through which to see her words. Without knowing the circumstances that kicked off the post, the reader is left to decide whether or not the voice is trustworthy enough to follow, and 9 times out of 10, when someone is being vague without reason (the exception being when a person is forthcoming and states they needed to keep it vague to protect another person’s identity), their words come across as hollow, without substance.

(4) Respond to the words on the page, not what you believe was the author’s or commenter’s intention. The only facts the reader has to work with are those that are on the screen. As a commenter, do not use the comment box to spout your own personal message but instead use the post as part of a conversation. We al
l bring with us our life experiences when we read a post, but when I read something on a topic near and dear to my heart, I don’t bring in aspects of the argument that were not contained in the post. In kind, as a writer, be clear about your intentions. As an example, unless otherwise contained in the post, if a writer is speaking critically about the Duggars, they are speaking about the Duggars and not all large families. Therefore, the comments should be about the criticism of the Duggars and not about how the commenter feels offended that the author doesn’t support all large families.

(5) Stay away from blanket statements and referring to broad groups of people (either positively or negatively). I think the best comments on the BlogHer post came when people didn’t make blanket statements about everyone in a situation but instead had the person speak of their own personal experience and state that they understand that a single experience does not stand in place for a whole group.

(6) If you’re not prepared to be open-minded and see the world from a different angle, stay away from the interactive medium of blogs that day. There are days when I just don’t want to consider anyone else’s life but my own. And those are the days when I don’t open Google Reader or surf the Web. I read books, watch television, and do a host of activities that do not have an interactive nature to them. Reading blogs is not a daily requirement like a vitamin–it’s okay to skip them if you’re not in the right mood.

What else would you add to this list of how to read, write, or comment on the Internet doing minimal emotional damage to others? The reality is that no one is perfect, you don’t always know who is reading a post, and the point is not to squelch creativity or free speech, but to help people to speak their mind in a way that is productive and moves us forward rather than circling in our own or another person’s anger.

somewhat cross-posted with blogher…