isoglossia

My brother answers the question orginally posed here. Note the tablesaw injury. Use a push-stick, man!

My brother is named for our late maternal uncle. I am named after our late paternal grandfather. In fact, in my generation all of us are named to honor or remember some forebear. Quite the opposite is true in the next generation; as far as I know, none of my nieces and nephews, or my own son, are named for anyone in particular.*

In response to the latest Adam post, I recently heard from S, an old roommate who is in touch with a mutual acquaintance from our college days, whose name happens to be Adam. I never knew this guy all that well, so it was obviously a joke when S reported that he’d told college Adam that I’d named my son after him. “He glowed when I told him,” S reported, even though it can’t be possible that college Adam could believe such a story. It made me laugh, though, because if there were ever anyone I would go out my way to not name my son after, it would be this guy.

To begin with, his car (a Duster, if I remember correctly), had flames painted on it. Badly. The car was a faded yellow and the flames were monotone brick red. It could’ve been irony, but I really don’t think so. This was a guy whose idea of a good time was spend the afternoon at the illegal dump shooting rats with a pellet gun. He kept stolen bottles of ether –ether– under his bed. I also recall a story about him picking up a local girl with a cleft palate, and later singing the praises of — oh, never mind.

I occasionally hear second-hand that college Adam has gone on to become a fine, upstanding member of the community, and even has a young son of his own. Why not? Who was perfect during their college years? This is not about casting stones, but rather to set the record straight: we did not name our son after ether-sniffin’ rat-blastin’ flame-car-drivin’ Adam.

We named him after Adam WEST.

* This misapprehension is corrected in the comments.