By Jody Worsham
All rights
reserved for court costs for legal name change.
New
grandmothers and grandfathers get to pick the name they want their
grandchildren to call them or so I’ve learned.
My friends can decide to be Nana, Grandmaw, MeMaw, Big Mama (although I
certainly would not pick that one for myself even though it would fit), Mimi or
Pop, Gramps, G-daddy, PawPaw, Poppa etc.
I had
several names picked out for myself, grand names for a grand mother…such names
as Grand MaMa with the accent on the last Ma pronounced with a slight French
accent. It didn’t matter. The first grandchild had her own ideas about
what she would call me. Early on I
thought I would be forever known as BeeBee.
Then she got tubes in her ears and I became Mimi. Then we adopted her and her brother and after
a lot of confusion and explanation to their friends, I became just Mama which
is what I had called my grandmother.
Recently, and
with no indication we would be going into the Witness Protection Program
anytime in the future, the seven-year-old has dubbed me “Heymama” as in:
“Hey! Mama! Watch this.”
“Hey! Mama! Wanna
see what I caught?”
“Hey! Mama, can I have a Dr. Pepper?”
At some
point “Hey, Mama” became “Heymama”.
Maybe my hearing is declining (duh,
really?) and he thinks he must first get my attention by yelling “HEY” and when I turn toward the sound he
follows up with “Mama”.
But I won’t
fret about it. It could be worse. He could have called out “Oh, Mama!”
6 comments:
Wow! You have your hands full. I just have two dogs and that's enough for me. It's funny what names kids will come up with to call the people in their lives. My friend's little boy has to call me Jenny, Jen, Jen, Jen pretty much every time he sees me. It's fine and cute. I have a feeling once he gets older that will stop.
"Heymama" does have a nice ring to it! "Oh Mama" sounds like you did something embarrassing. I cringe when I hear the occasional "Oh Mother" from my grown sons, so you are way ahead in the game. Julie
So funny, Jody. I'm Grandma to my great-grands. Their grandmother is Mammaw. However, The oldest's other grandmother wants to be called Grandma, so she's taught him to call me Great-Grandma. It doesn't really matter, as long as he's talking to me. That may change when he reaches 13.
When I became a grandmother for the first time, I jokingly said that I wanted to be called Gra-a-a-annd MaMa and I wanted it to be said in a French accent. Since the kids weren't born French, the name was whittled down to Mamama. No grand involved, but I did get three syllables.
"heymama" makes me think of that song "Hey mambo. Mambo italiano. Hey mambo..." I always hear them say mama instead of mambo. :P
You made my day. Thanks for the smile! I guess youngest has decided to call me,"Ma...ma...ma...ma," because even though I answer when he calls, he keeps calling. Must look into ear tubes!
Post a Comment