February 14, 2013 at 10:58 pm , by Nick Shell

2 years, 2 months.

Dear Jack,

As I reached for the shower curtain and a towel to dry myself off this morning, there you were with Mommy, waiting for me to realize I had visitors. You had a sneaky look on your face.

“Hi Jill!” you proudly greeted me.

Right name, wrong parent.

We felt you were old enough to know that Mommy and Daddy have other names, or as we call them: first names.

The problem is, you think my name is Jill and that Mommy’s name is Nick.

That’s okay. You’ll get it eventually. I don’t think it’s a bad idea for you to know our first names.

What if you get lost in a store? How will you tell someone who your parents are? We figured it wouldn’t hurt to teach you our “real names” for such an unfortunate event.

Until now, I had never thought about what age is appropriate to teach you our names other than Mommy and Daddy. For all I know, maybe it’s too soon.

I wondered at first if this was a recipe for disaster since you might start mainly calling us by our first names. However, I don’t think that will be a problem. You laugh every time you say our first names; as if they are our “funny names.”

As for the next name I shall teach you, what about our last name? Shouldn’t you know that too if you get separated from us somewhere in public? Fortunately for you, it’s an easy one: Shell.

One syllable names like Jack, Jill, Nick, and Shell definitely serve as an advantage to you, as a 2 year-old. You just happened to be born into a family with easy-to-say and easy-to-spell names.

As for your Croatian and Norwegian ancestors on Mommy’s side of the family, they probably had a more difficult time with this.

Just imagine, at best your name would have been something like… Ivan Ljùštura.

(I think I’m pronouncing that right.)

 

Love,

Daddy