Sunday SummaryHappy sixteenth Sunday of 2015!

My name-related discovery of the week: every ZipCar has a name.

We’re brand new ZipCar members – after two years of playing ice hockey at our local, easily-reachable-by-transit-when-necessary ice rink, our son has graduated to the bigger rink in the ‘burbs. Since we’re a one-car family – and that car is older than the hockey player – this presents some challenges.

Enter ZipCar.

And thus, my discovery that every car has a name, including Aurelia and Susann and Enya and Effie and Clement. Guinevere and Penelope. Not all of the names resemble given names. The ZipCar closest to us is a called Steppig, and names like Fishingline, Wasabi, and Pagoda are pretty normal, too. Every now and then, one of those unexpected names might actually work as a given name. Calderin, maybe?

It had me thinking about the act of naming something. Steppig isn’t just a great transportation alternative for us – it’s like a new neighbor. I’d like to think we’d treat it with care even if it was just ZC78120b, but something tells me that the name changes the way I see the object.

Do you use ZipCar? Are there any great names on the ZipCars in your neighborhood?

Now, back to the names of actual human beings:

That’s all for this week! As always, thank you for reading – and have a great week!

About Abby Sandel

Whether you're naming a baby, or just all about names, you've come to the right place! Appellation Mountain is a haven for lovers of obscure gems and enduring classics alike.

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4 Comments

  1. My name is April and I was born in April. I haven’t met a tremendous amount of people with my name, but all of them were also born in April. Every new person I meet feels the need to ask me when my birthday is and then immediately follow that with “is that why you were named April?” It does get old, but it’s been happening my whole life so I’m pretty used to it now.
    My mom always said that when she was a teenager she’d written a short story about a girl named April and knew then that if she ever had a girl that’s the name she would give. She could never produce the story though so I liked to tease her that she had a long time to come up with that story before I started asking questions 🙂

  2. Winter Fawn was given to me because I was born in a blizzard. I did some research, and apparently, it has been a really common norm to give babies names according to circumstances and that would include war names, war leaders surnames as first, locations of big events such as wars and treaties and even seasons. Also, If the people who chose the surname Winter can choose it as their lineage name because they liked the season and pretty cave paintings, then yes, a child born in the season deserves just as much right to the name. Although, it would be an awkward feeling to run into a man named Winter and even develope a or a elationship. Both my parents are Robin and spelled exactly the same. We owned a private business, and it was sometimes fun taking phone calls. Where customers would ask to speak with Robin, I then would have to ask them, “the male or female Robin? ” It confused the person on the phone everytime. After a while it did get old. So season, nature, location, street names do come with a small sacrifice.

  3. Have to admit, I was less than impressed with that list. If you’re reaching back to Shakespeare using it, well, how do you know where he found it? I have a Gwendolyn, and I can tell you that getting to Wendy from there is not much of a stretch at all, especially given that we’re nowhere near the original Welsh pronunciation. I love her name, but that “Gw” combo is not an easy one for little mouths to make. Her little sister is just coming out of calling her “Go-knee”, but dropping the G for the w would have been just as easy, and much cuter (I had a brief fling with “Wendy” myself, just after she was born, but it didn’t stick.)