Can You Name a Kitten?

They say the test of literary power is whether a man can write an inscription. I say, ‘Can he name a kitten?’  ~Samuel Butler

Have you had the pleasure of naming some kittens? Maybe a dog? Or best of all, a sweet new baby in your arms? With those babies, you have months to debate the perfect name and get your spouse to agree.

When I had my babies back when, you had to wait until the doctor delivered the baby and told you “it’s a girl” or “it’s a boy.” Now couples know the sex of their babies almost as soon as they know they are going to be parents. I’ve known a few couples who decided not to know their baby’s sex until the baby was born, but most people don’t want to wait. They want to buy pink or blue for the baby’s new room. In fact, many of them decide on the name long before the birth date.

But in the olden days before all these new tests, ultrasounds, and gender reveal parties, you had to think up names for both a boy and a girl. Just in case. I have two sons and one daughter.  My husband had seen or heard the name Tarasa on the radio or maybe in a movie. When he mentioned it, I latched onto it right away although I may have spelled it differently. I liked the look of all those a’s, but I think my spelling did make trouble for my daughter since we pronounced the name Taresa.  But the a’s just looked better.

We had to wait a few years until that sweet girl came our way. Naming the boys was a little different. The first son was named after my dad and my husband. The second son and third child had a much debated name. My husband would mention a name and I’d frown and shake my head. I’d mention a name and he’d frown and shake his head. I can’t remember now if we agreed on a girl’s name or not, but we did finally agree on Daniel as a boy’s name. It could be that my older son, tired of our back and forth name disagreements, suggested Daniel. Anyway, when he was born, he didn’t have to go nameless while we did more debating.

Whatever name you pick for a baby or even for a dog or a kitten, does fit after a while. I do sometimes wonder if I should have given my dog, Frankie, a less energetic name or maybe I think the name is energetic now because of Frankie. Nobody was excited about the name when I told them. But I had named him on that crazy drive home from the humane shelter where I had to drive with one hand and hold him off in the seat beside me with the other hand. Maybe I should have tried the name Sleepy.

Whatever name you pick, you might have to say it a few times. You might have to convince the grandparents or your siblings that it’s the right name, but a few weeks or months down the road and the name generally fits. My daughter-in-law had that experience with her first daughter. She picked a name and shared it with her family. One of them spent the next however many months trying to talk her out of the name that she had already fallen in love with. So for her next two daughters, nobody but my son and her knew the names until the baby was born.

If I’m gonna tell a real story, I’m gonna start with my name. ~Kendrick Lamar

When I start down a story path for a new book, I have to start with a name too. The name of my character or all my main characters. Over the years, I’ve named many, many characters. Sometimes I pick a name and work with it a while and then realize that no, this person is not named that.

In my upcoming release, The Song of Sourwood Mountain, I changed the main female character a couple of times. She started out as Virginia/Ginny and became Almira/Mira. The main male character started out Gordon, got changed to Drew and then back to Gordon. My young mountain girl was Ada June from the first. The name was actually the inspiration for her character in the story.

I like names that are a little unusual. Tansy was perfect for my packhorse librarian in Along a Storied Trail. Piper worked for my Frontier nursing courier in An Appalachian Summer. Other names I pick for my main characters are more common names you might hear anywhere. I do try to make them fit the time period and wherever they grew up. At times, I can have a name that my new character just does not like at all. If that happens, that character will just lay there on the paper and not show the first sign of life. Sigh. That’s when I have to get out my old name book and start searching again.

So what about it? Can you name a kitten? I have a cat about ready to come on the scene in the story I’m working on right now. I hadn’t really thought about what it might look like yet, but the ghostly gray white cat in the picture up top with those gorgeous blue eyes will work. My main character has beautiful eyes too. She’s never felt as though she’s pretty since she has a blonde, blue-eyed, very pretty younger sister. But Elena has some beautiful eyes. So does this cat.

What woud you name my cat?