As I’ve mentioned in a number of columns over the years, I’m certainly a huge “Seinfeld” fan. Although the final installment has been an impossible 25 years ago, the show remains so very easily accessed on both cable and streaming services to this day.
Recently, the episode I watched again was one that originally aired on May 20, 1993. Devotees of the show will recall early episodes used to begin with a clip from Jerry’s stand-up act, and in this episode’s opening, the comedian was talking about names.
Said Seinfeld, “Ever notice a lot of butlers are named Jeeves? You know, I think when you name a baby ‘Jeeves,’ you’ve pretty much mapped out his future, wouldn’t you say? Not much chance he’s going to be a hit man, I think, after that.”
That’s what got me thinking a bit about people and their names. To be honest, I’ve always been pretty fascinated by people’s names, since I believe names are distinctly human. While we humans always name our newbies and are also pretty famous for naming our pets, I’m pretty certain when it comes to animals, they’re not using any direct address when they communicate with one another, as in, “Hey, Fred, you seem to be shedding a lot less these days!”
I think perhaps the reason for my fascination with names may have something to do with the fact that I had to memorize so many so quickly back in my teaching days. After all, I surely didn’t want to be looking down at that seating chart fumbling for a name for much more than a week or so. If you’re going to make a student feel welcome, you can’t be addressing them by saying, “Hey, you.”
Certain names from my St. Marys Memorial days have stayed with me long after I retired. From the stark finality of the several Kills (who were some of the nicest of any young people who ever spent a school year with me) to the Griffins (who looked nothing like those mythological creatures with lions’ bodies and birds’ heads) and on to those who carried either the occupational names of the past or present, such as the Millers, Weavers and Coopers and Carpenters.
Names truly do give each of us a uniqueness, no matter how common the name, and sometimes those names really do seem quite appropriate to some in certain occupations. I think about that sometimes when I’m doing a cleaning inspection. In one of my Indiana college accounts, I smile each time I walk by one of the English professor’s offices when I see her last name, which is McGrade. I wonder if her students once receiving their compositional work back ask each other, “What’s your McGrade?”
Back in my student-teaching days during my senior year at Miami University, at Wilson Junior High in Hamilton, my mentoring teacher was named Elizabeth Barrett, so very appropriate for an English teacher, given the Victorian Era poet of the same name, who married the English poet and playwright Robert Browning, to form, for my money, the greatest husband-and-wife literary team of all time. I remember my Elizabeth Barrett so very fondly for her positive and encouraging influences.
I always thought that the fastest man in the world, Usain Bolt — now retired but still holder of the world record in the 100 meters who covered that distance in a jaw-dropping 9.58 seconds — had the single-most appropriate name in sports history. I mean, really, what’s faster than a bolt of lightning?
As for football players, the name that tops my list of most appropriate for such a tough-guy sport is former NFL linebacker for the Vikings, Colts and Saints, Steve Stonebreaker.
As for other names from the world of sports, I’ve often thought, had they chosen a different field, how their names would have been perfect. How about if former NFL All-Pro lineman Dave Butz had pursued a career as a proctologist? Or if former baseball player Wally Moon had decided to become an astronaut and had replaced Neil Armstrong on the launch that would have put him instead on the lunar surface on a certain July day in 1969?
I’ll leave you today with a final name that seems to me to be pretty appropriate. Several weeks ago, I stumbled on a documentary on Netflix on Bernie Madoff entitled “Madoff, the Monster of Wall Street” and thought to myself that he was just a single vowel away from having a very appropriate name. The missing -e, however, doesn’t really impact how his name was or is now posthumously pronounced. It’s pronounced “made off,” as in, the guy who made off with all those investors’ loot!
John Grindrod is a regular columnist for The Lima News, a freelance writer and editor and the author of two books. Reach him at [email protected].
