~ I've owned my B for a little over three years now, I've been inside
~ the engine, replaced the clutch, swapped carbs, done the brakes, etc..
~ I think it is time I named it something other than "the MG". The only
~ name I've thought of that appeals to me so far is Humpty Dumpty
~ because it often seems that all the Kings horses and all the Kings men
~ won't be able to put it back together again.
If I might be so bold as to suggest a name for Bob's MGB: Penelope,
forever doing and undoing her tapestry while Odysseus toiled in Ilium,
refusing all suitors till the work was done. Though as she lived in
Ithaca, perhaps the name is more appropriate to one of Roger's cars.
~ Any other suggestions?
(Stand back: somebody musta put a nickel in Scott...)
The Naming of Cats
The naming of cats is a difficult matter,
It isn't just one of your holiday games.
You may think at first I'm as mad as a hatter
When I tell you a cat must have Three Different Names.
First of all, there's the name that the family use daily,
Such as Peter, Augustus, Alonzo or James,
Such as Victor or Jonathan, George or Bill Bailey:
All of them sensible everyday names.
There are fancier names if you think they sound sweeter,
Some for the gentlemen, some for the dames,
Such as Plato, Admetus, Electra, Demeter,
All of them sensible everyday names.
But I tell you, a cat needs a name that's particular,
A name that's peculiar, and more dignified,
Else how can he keep up his tail perpendicular,
Or spread out his whiskers, or cherish his pride?
Of names of this kind I can give you a quorum,
Such as Munkustrap, Quaxo, or Coricopat,
Such as Bombalurina, or else Jellylorum:
Names that never belong to more than one cat.
But still and above all one name is left over,
And that is the name that you never will guess:
The name that no human research can discover,
But the Cat Himself Knows -- and will never confess.
When you notice a cat in serene contemplation,
The reason, I tell you, is always the same:
The cat is engaged in a rapt meditation
Of the thought, of the thought, of the thought of his name --
His ineffable, effable,
Effanineffable,
Deep and inscrutable singular Name.
--T.S. Eliot, "The Naming of Cats," from
"Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats" (Faber & Faber)
What can I add to this? Mere anecdotes, I fear.
My cars have mostly named themselves, at least such cars as I
have owned that had sufficient character to deserve, even demand,
names. Sometimes they named themselves within moments of my
acquiring them. Sometimes they acquired names from friends or
relations. And sometimes, only after years of waffling and giving
names that didn't stick or didn't fit or just didn't wear well,
they have finally whispered in my ear their deep and inscrutable
singular Name, in a moment of supreme intimacy and communion
with the intangibles that make these things so much more than
steel and chrome, vinyl and copper and aluminum.
Right now I have four cars, all of whom have names. Rosilla, of
course, was named by my daughter Torrey, who is the living image
of Anne of Green Gables ("Brewer's Pond is so prosaic -- I shall
call it 'The Lake of Shining Waters.'") "Rosilla Heartstand Cherry,"
Torrey thus clept her shortly after purchase; the first name is
actually ro-ZEE-ah, I have given it a Spanish spelling (as in tortilla)
because of my geography. "Rosilla, because she's red," Torrey
explained. "And Heartstand?" Kim asked. No answer; we think it's
because she makes your heart stand up when you see her. Cherry likewise
of course for the color. Our whitish 144 is known as Hildy, after
Kim saw her the first time and said, "Oh, that sort of newsprint-
colored car?" Hildy Brooks, you may recall, is the character that
Rosalind Russell played in The Front Page.
The Zed Ex is Odette. The first day I had her, I drove to Chris' to
ruin a little more paint on his GT6, and on the way back I decided to
listen to the radio (wow! music in car!) and the local classical station
was playing Swan Lake. A white car, gliding gracefully down Alma street
while the haunting strains of Tschaikowsky's ballet wailed from the oboe
through the four-speaker stereo; Odette she was and Odette she remains.
And yes, should I ever acquire a black one, she would have to be Odile.
But the M.G. rebuffed all my efforts to find a name. My first M.G.,
a 1974 Midget, was such a little orange tomcat of a car that we gave
him a masculine name (Kim picked it -- Garfield, because he hated to
get up in the morning, and it was long enough ago that Jim Davis was
still funny, to give you an idea of how distant those days were). My
second M.G., a B, was a sort of shabby military khaki, and he was also
rather whimsical in his determination to run, or not, as the case
may have been; we called him The Major, and the owners of Sybil and
Basil will get that one ("Of course, Fawlty! You gave me that money --
you won it on a horse!") And of course there was a bit of Gilbert
and Sullivan, as the initials for Major General were too good to pass
up ("While my military knowledge, although plucky and adventury, has
only been brought down to the beginning of the century/Yet still in
matters vegetable, animal and mineral I am the very model of a modern
major general.")
Naturally, I assumed that The Green Car would also be masculine. For
five years I labored under this assumption, trying names the way Imelda
Marcos tried on shoes. Strider, for a while, because of the rusty
green and brown and because the car "looked foul but feels fair." Nigel,
for a while, after British actor Nigel Green (fooled you), who has one
of film's greatest lines in the movie "Zulu:" "Plus a bayonet, sir.
With some guts behind it." (It works best in context.)
While preparing for the current rebuild, I was projecting to the future
when I'd eventually have this car painted. I was imagining the conversation
I'd have with the body shop. "I don't want a show car," I would say. "This
car is a daily driver, always has been. It's not a race car; the race
motor blew up, and while I've autocrossed it, it's never really wanted
to be a race car. This car is happiest when I drive it to work every
day, or at least every sunny day; it works best when it's the car I rely
on and count on for everyday driving. This car, in short, lives with no
other thought than to love and be loved by me."
And I burst into spontaneous tears (I am either the reincarnation of a
Russian or an Italian, I fear; certainly this emotionalism can't come
from such stoic British-Scottish-German background as my forebears
admit to). And she's been Annabel Lee ever since.
Kim wonders whether this is such a good name. "I mean, doesn't the
writer go mad and finally die when he loses her?"
"Exactly so," I said, with a strange light in my eyes. Kim just backed
away slowly.
--Scott "I was a child and she was a child in our kingdom by the sea" Fisher
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