My Parents: Favoured and Beloved by Alan Anderson

 

“Honour your father and mother” (this is the first commandment with a promise), “that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land.”—Ephesians 6: 2-3.

 

 

I dedicate this message to my parents.

 

 

The meaning of my name, Alan, is “precious.” Well, being my parents gave me this name, I accept it as a gift from the two precious people who also gave me life.

 

My mother’s name was Agnes, which means pure, but she went by a name related to her birth name. For as long as I can remember my dad, her sisters, her friends, and others called her Nancy. Nancy means favour or grace, or God has favoured me.

 

My grandparents gave my dad the name, “David.” The meaning of his name is, “beloved.” Most people called him, “Dave.”

 

My parents had distinct differences in personalities from each other. My dad could be strict and firm, yet soft, full of fun and love. Love, gentleness, funny, and thoughtful come to my mind when I think of my mom. My parents raised me along with my five siblings as best they could. They raised us when it was common for a mother to stay home for her children. She did this well.

 

My dad worked most of his teen years until he joined the British Navy as a young man of eighteen at the time of World War Two. He never spoke of the war years. I never knew him to be out of work until he retired when he turned sixty-five. As a Christian, he loved to sing in the church choir.

 

I gave no thought to the meaning of my name when I was in my younger years. I remember many times while in school I wished I had an alternate name. Teachers had the irritating habit of using the alphabet as a tool. For instance, I can still hear the words of my teacher’s introduction to a class assignment. “I will call out your names alphabetically and you will tell the class what you did this summer. Okay, Alan, you are first.” No escape to this agony presented itself. “Come on Alan, we’re waiting.” Full of reluctance, I stood up and informed my classmates of my summer.

 

Many times, when I got home from school, I asked my mom, the favoured one, things like, “How come both my names begin with the letter “A”?” In a masterful way, my mom would reply, “Because that’s your name!” What? How does this help? She would then sit me down and give me a cookie. I still love cookies.

 

My dad worked as a school custodian prior to my parents packing us up and emigrating to Canada. When I was eight, my dad taught me how to clean out the coal furnaces responsible for heating the school. This was a tough job, but I soon became used to it. The coal dust made me dirty, and this never thrilled my mom. I was fine with it.

Those memorable days with my parents are in the distant past. I still look back on them as precious. Now I am older, I understand the meaning of my name even more. Life is precious and in God’s eyes I am as well.

 

Both of my parents died a few years ago. I think of them every day. They are never far from my thoughts. Thank God for precious memories with them. May their memories be eternal.

 

Alan lives in Deroche, B.C. with his wife, Terry. He contributed stories to Good Grief People by Angel Hope Publishing, 2017 and Story by Story: The Power of a Writer, Unstoppable Writers Publishing, 2018. Alan has also written articles for FellowScript Magazine. Blog: https://scarredjoy.ca. Alan is the Provincial Rep. Liaison and BC Rep for InScribe. Alan is currently working on his book, "Plant Them A Garden: A Reflective Work of Grief, Faith, and Poetry.

The Story of a Name -- by Denise Falk

Photo Source: Jon Tyson on Unsplash

My mother had my name chosen before she even finished elementary school. She and her best friend promised each other that when they grew up and got married, they would name their daughters after each other. My name was set to be ‘Jocelyn’, or Josie for short, and everyone in the family knew of the ‘pact” that Connie and Josie had made. We don’t talk about that now though, because I have a cousin, who’s a year older than me, named Jocelyn.

The story continues that my Mom was going to call me ‘Elise’ next, because it sounded so ‘graceful and sophisticated’, but by the time I arrived, I became ‘Denise’. It doesn’t have any special meaning that I know of other than it’s a French name that means ‘lover of wine’, which is actually hilarious because I really don’t like wine.

Overall though, I liked my name growing up. It was easy to spell, easy to say but, unfortunately, it was also far too easy to remember because of a joke that went viral in the 1960s of a pregnant woman who was involved in an accident and, while in the hospital, she fell into a coma. When she awoke days later, the woman noticed that she was no longer carrying a child, and asked, "Doc, what happened to my baby!"

The doctor replied, "Ma'am, you've had twins! You're the proud mother of a handsome baby boy and a beautiful baby girl. Also, you should know that while you were in a coma, your brother named the children for you."

"Oh, no!" shrieked the woman. "Not my brother!"

The doctor replied, "Well, ma'am, your brother named your daughter Denise."

"Oh, well that's not so bad," smiled the woman. Then, hesitantly, she asked, "What's the boy's name?"

The doctor grinned and said, "De-nephew."

I would cringe when I could sense someone was about to say, “Hey Denise, how’s De-nephew,” but I learned early on to be polite, to laugh and allow them to retell that tired old joke, because to be honest, I didn’t even understand what it meant.

I learned right from the start to hold my name loosely, either people were laughing and making the ‘de-nephew’ joke or mixing up the verbal and spelling nuances between the feminine and masculine forms. To this day, I continue to be called Dennis and Denis often.

My brother called me ‘Den-Den’ growing up. He initially meant it as a sibling insult, thrown around as kids do in some fight about who would choose the after school tv show, or who could have their friends over for dinner. That name stuck though, and as we grew up, I continued to be Den-Den to him. He was the only one who could call me that, and he would smirk while saying it too, eyes glinting with sibling ribbing. I miss being called Den-Den and have missed my brother a lot since he journeyed ahead of us all to heaven, far too early.

Denise is a great name, and it has served me well so far in life, but the story of my name is far from finished. The most important Person in my life calls me something else – he calls me His ‘masterpiece’ in Ephesians 2:10! 

Compared to the incredible beauty of the all the things that God has created, he calls ‘me’ His masterpiece, and what’s more, He has also given me a brand-new name! God has a new name for me that he wrote on the stone (Rev 2:17) (Isaiah 62:2), that is an everlasting name that will not be cut off (Isaiah 56:5) and one that will serve God’s purposes for all eternity. Isn’t that just incredible! Isn’t He wonderful!    

Gloria - A Welcoming, Celebratory Name

 

A few facts about living with the name Gloria:

 I hated it. It sounded old fashioned and for an old lady. 

It was regularly sung every single year at Christmas Concerts. I can’t remember the first time that I had to hear my name sung with long, drawn out syllables, or worse yet when I myself had to participate in singing it in a school concert, but it soon became a yearly occurrence. To me it was mortifying. Later someone would start singing my name, usually off tune, with taunts of Gloriiiiiiaaaaaa ringing down the hall. Torture. To be honest, I’ve had many an adult do it to me too!! I’ve gotten tougher skin now though and I know people mean it mostly in humor. 

However, I still continued to hate my name. 

Some more facts: 

It means ‘Glory to God’ which is a very special meaning. But as a child, I cared more about how it sounded and thought it not a pretty, soft sounding popular name like most of the girls seemed to have.

It’s Latin and is therefore much more popular in Latin America. But I grew up in a world where girls were named Lorie, Heather, Sally & Carol (a Christmas name too but so much prettier and not to be made fun of).-

My mother once confessed that I was named after a nun in a Catholic hospital, who had helped her with my birth. Horror of horrors!! 

And so, I continued to hate my name right throughout my entire adult years. 

I did grow into it somewhat, as I aged….and became a Grandma. Grandma Gloria had a nice ring. But I still didn’t really feel it suited me, personally. Me, bring Glory to God? A little too lofty. I should have something more simple and sentimental. I loved my middle name of Lynn and felt that’s what I should have been called. It means waterfall or cascade. I’m a lover of water and consider water my ‘happy place.’ So I continued to still struggle with my ‘hate/love’ relationship with my full name. 

There was one thing that I did like about the name Gloria though, and that is when it came off of my mother’s tongue, in the short form of ‘Glory.’ She called me that often and it always sounded softer and more loving when she called me that. My husband took it up also and I am often called ‘Glory’ by him too. And so between that and now being ‘Grandma Gloria’ it helped. 

And then, a couple of years ago, something very special happened, to change my feelings completely about the name Gloria. It was Christmas time…again…but by then I was pretty steeled to the usual sounds of Glooorrrrriiiiaaaaa floating through the air somewhere, whether sung well, or not so well, or downright butchered. Often I can ignore it or barely notice it now. On this day however, I was in for a surprise. We had flown to Ontario for Christmas, to be with our son, and his wife and daughter. I was excited as it would be our first Christmas with them, but in the moment, I was also tired. As I was headed down the escalator feeling drained and just wanting some rest…. I saw and heard it at the same time. A small band had set up at the bottom of the escalator near the baggage claim and were peeling out the sounds of Glooooorrrrrriiiiiaaaaa. I waited for that deep begrudging feeling that I usually got when I had to endure that song, especially when I wasn’t up for it…but it didn’t come. It  sounded good! It was beautiful actually, the way the musical notes of my name rose up to me, enveloped my tired being, and held me in a welcoming embrace. To think that this name that had actually heralded the Christ Child into the world could make me feel so welcome too?! And just like that, the song that I had hated for most of my life and the name that I had hated, I no longer did! I loved the song and I felt the first real embers of love for  my name ignite in my heart…my welcoming, celebratory name! A name that celebrated the Christ child and invites me and us all to do the same. 

“Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.” Luke 2: 13-14 NIV 

Gloria Lynn Guest lives and writes from Caron, Sk. 

The Third Daughter By Vickie Stam

 My name did come easy....

I am named after my father who was born in Kapuskasing, Ontario to French-Canadian parents. He was given the name Aurel and in English he goes by, Harold.

My mother wanted to name one of their children after him, something that isn't uncommon and usually falls on the shoulders of the firstborn. My mother in all of her wisdom had decided that if she had a girl she would call her Haroldine - just like other little girls who were affectionately known as Jeraldine, named after their father, Jerald. But, in 1957 when my sister was born, my father refused to go along with this outlandish idea. He flat out said, "NO."

Six years later another daughter arrived and the answer remained the same. Two children and no namesake. Have no fear though - eighteen months later another daughter was born. My mother went ahead and filled out the paperwork for my birth certificate and penned Haroldine in as my middle name. A compromise - Vickie Haroldine is my name - a name that I learned to appreciate over time.

Growing up, I dared not share such an odd middle name with other kids. It seemed to me that my friends all had normal middle names, prettier names and ones that sometimes were actually two used as one, like my cousins, Barbara Louise, and Carry Anne. 

Whenever my friends asked what my middle name was, I pretended that I didn't have one or I thought of something that I thought went well together. Eg: Vickie Lynn. And to add fuel to the fire, my mother threw an (ie) on the end of Vickie and did not name me Victoria. I was born with a 'nickname.' 

It was dreadful for me to have to continually tell people, "Vickie is my given name and then have to actually spell it for them to boot. What was my mother thinking? 

I learned to smile when I got a response such as, 

"Oh... like the Miss Vickie chips!"

"Those chips are so good. Have you tried them?" An office clerk once asked me.

"Oh... silly me, you must have." She said. "Everyone has."

"No I haven't, but I'm sure the are quite tasty." I clucked back, wondering if I was supposed to feel honoured that my name is sprawled across a bag of chips.

It really wasn't until I was a student in a writing class in 2012 where I came to treasure my name. A fellow classmate's story suddenly pierced my heart without him even knowing it. He shared how his name was a "precious gift" from his mother. He recalled how his mother knew exactly what she was going to name him if God would give her a son. Wow! I couldn't help but hang on every word as he wiped away the tears from his eyes. 

Was it a gift for my father or for me? I'm not sure why my mother was so relentless in naming one of her children Haroldine. But, what I do know is that my name doesn't need to be popular or famous. It doesn't need to define who I am, my personality or even make me feel accepted by others. It just needs to be appreciated as the gift it truly is - a name given with love from my parents.  

And most important --- is that God knows my name...

Isaiah 43:1 "Fear not, for I have called you by name; I have summoned you by name; you are mine"