Nickname

I ran into a former (après-retirement) colleague of mine at the library this afternoon. She was towing her eight-month old daughter who I had not met, a cute, healthy, happy, smiling infant. I asked what the child’s name is, and the reply was T-bone (the spelling might be Teabone or Teebone or something else, but I want to think it’s T-bone). Familiar with the premature eccentricity of my young colleague and her partner, this didn’t take me back at all. My initial response (internal) was, how perfect – the kid starts life with a nickname. I always wanted a nickname myself. During high school, I wanted to be called Skip (for whatever reason I don’t at all recall). In college, I harbored a desire to go by Sal (the nickname of the narrator in Kerouac’s On the Road (though J.L. McClure doesn’t move as easily to Sal as Salvatore Paradise does)). But one can’t assign one’s self a nickname. A nickname either comes – from a given name or a physical attribute or a behavior – or doesn’t. For me, it never did. But little T-bone begins with a built-in nickname, and a pretty good one at that (though it would be better if she were to move to Chicago or Kansas City later in life). No doubt there will be eyebrows raised when she enters the classroom and has her name read off the roster at the beginning of class. Then again, maybe she’ll get a nickname of her own – maybe Teresa or Tracy or Tammy.