And you shall be called…
Posted on July 14, 2006 - Filed Under Uncategorized
When Erin was pregnant, as many of you know, we elected to not be told the gender of our child via the ultrasound scan. I could go on for a while about why but it boils down to this: Through science, reason, discovery, etc., we humans have removed so much mystery from our everyday lives. Erin and I believe this hurts the soul, that it’s just another form of instant gratification, and the only useful reason to know is so you know what to buy, i.e. pink or blue, a girl’s room or a boy’s. And if buying stuff is the only reason to take all of that wonder, awe, humility, and reverence for the process of becoming a human being out of becoming a parent, well, it’s just wasn’t (and still isn’t) good enough for us.
It truly was a lot of fun. One of the ways it was so was in what I chose to call the fetus. In our search for names, we kind of wanted to honor the people in our families by selecting a name from that pool. Unfortunately, no one has a name we liked enough to actually choose it. And it struck us one day that our field of possible choices was somewhat narrowed by the fact that we have a total of four men who are named Robert. So, given that we didn’t know the gender and that we weren’t going to name the child Robert, I decided to pay at least temporary homage to those guys by referring to the baby as ‘Bob.’ I thought this was pretty funny, especially if the baby was a girl; Erin, on the other hand, really did not like me doing this, so I had to stop. 
One of the benefits of not knowing Maggie was a girl was that we hadn’t completely decided on a name. Our top choice was Sadie (I don’t think we had a middle name picked out). I think when you know whether you’re having a boy or a girl, one of the temptations is go ahead and name your child before it’s even born. This is so contrary to how things have been done for tens of thousands of years, especially among the more Earth-based cultures. Obviously, you can do that even if you don’t know the gender by selecting a name for each possibility. We took it one step further, however: When Maggie was born and I introduced her to her Mama, Erin said that she didn’t look like a Sadie. So, we decided within the next day or two that Maggie was our choice. It just so much more right to have done it that way.
Anyway, just one of those little tidbits that we might have forgotten if we didn’t write it down.
Comments
One Response to “And you shall be called…”
Leave a Reply
I think it might be overused for people~s own desires, but if it is for a genetic reason it is a wonderful advance. Think how many babies could be saved. I think pink and blue is more like a custom such as fourth of July fireworks. more of a fun thing.