Hooray! The owner of Abode on Market Square has named her new baby Hazel Mae.
I know this because it's painted in giant letters on the store's front window.
I dig this because Hazel is my girl name.
Risking a jinx, I state for the record that I have no intention of having babies. However, a few years back I landed on a pair of names I felt I should champion--not by procreating but through means of general promotion.
I have suggested to multiple people in a breeding state of mind that they name their baby-to-be either Hazel for a girl and Faron for a boy. It's time that some old names came back into popularity. Especially old flower names like Rose and Violet and Lily. Hazel I like because of Hazel Dickens, who sang pro-union coal mining songs, and I have a great aunt Hazel. I also knew a really sweet dog named Hazel, which is a legacy any baby named Hazel would be proud to carry on.
Faron I like because of Faron Young, the classic country singer who made Willie Nelson's "Hello Walls" a hit. The name Faron stuck with me after I saw a biography of Hank Williams in which Hank met redhead Billie Jean Jones in a bar and told her he would marry her, despite the fact she was the girlfriend of Faron Young. Romantic, no? (Hank's bio at the Country Music Hall of Fame website mentions the Faron/Hank connection but unforgivably doesn't mention Knoxville as the last place Hank was seen alive. Bah. That's Nashville for you. Anyway.)
I feel like an ambassador for these names, which should be given to children who will join the scads of Abigails and Madisons and Connors and Tanners in classrooms everywhere.
Rise up, you Hazels and Roses and Farons and Henrys! This is my plea for non-lame baby names: When I'm an old lady, I don't want to have to roll my eyes when I look at your name tag at the grocery store checkout line.
I know this because it's painted in giant letters on the store's front window.
I dig this because Hazel is my girl name.
Risking a jinx, I state for the record that I have no intention of having babies. However, a few years back I landed on a pair of names I felt I should champion--not by procreating but through means of general promotion.
I have suggested to multiple people in a breeding state of mind that they name their baby-to-be either Hazel for a girl and Faron for a boy. It's time that some old names came back into popularity. Especially old flower names like Rose and Violet and Lily. Hazel I like because of Hazel Dickens, who sang pro-union coal mining songs, and I have a great aunt Hazel. I also knew a really sweet dog named Hazel, which is a legacy any baby named Hazel would be proud to carry on.
Faron I like because of Faron Young, the classic country singer who made Willie Nelson's "Hello Walls" a hit. The name Faron stuck with me after I saw a biography of Hank Williams in which Hank met redhead Billie Jean Jones in a bar and told her he would marry her, despite the fact she was the girlfriend of Faron Young. Romantic, no? (Hank's bio at the Country Music Hall of Fame website mentions the Faron/Hank connection but unforgivably doesn't mention Knoxville as the last place Hank was seen alive. Bah. That's Nashville for you. Anyway.)
I feel like an ambassador for these names, which should be given to children who will join the scads of Abigails and Madisons and Connors and Tanners in classrooms everywhere.
Rise up, you Hazels and Roses and Farons and Henrys! This is my plea for non-lame baby names: When I'm an old lady, I don't want to have to roll my eyes when I look at your name tag at the grocery store checkout line.
Comments » 1
ckmarler writes:
I always liked this Faron Young story, I know it's depressing because he committed suicide, but the way Johnny Cash told the story was just funny. He said something like, "Leave it to Faron!"
"When close friend Faron Young committed suicide in 1997, the Cashes held a ceremony to scatter his ashes in their garden, but the wind blew them back at the mourners. He recalled, "When I came home, I found I had Faron on my windshield. I turned the wipers on. There he went, back and forth, back and forth, until he was all gone."
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