AIDEN

                     


             The Importance of Being Jack

               
                    "A good name is better
                     than precious oil." 
                                 Ecclesiastes

I was christened John Joseph: John after my mothers brother and Joseph, I can only surmise, after the husband of Mary the mother of Jesus. Growing up, no one ever called me by either of those names. From my earliest memory I was always called Jack.

That all changed when I joined the Navy. Every piece of my clothing was stenciled "JJ LEE" so almost overnight I became JJ. This moniker stayed with me through my four year tour of duty. When I was discharged from the service I entered college - another name change: all of my school records identified me as John J. Lee and other than my family and childhood friends I became known as John Lee. Through a forty year business career I remained John Lee.

Now that I am approaching my dotage I much prefer to be known as Jack. Perhaps it is a way of immortalizing my youth. As someone observed, "Like a dog peeing on a hydrant, asserting my existence." John is so formal and unexciting. Compared to Jack, John conjures up stale bread, warm beer; it is akin to kissing your sister. Besides, every Tom, Dick and Harry is named John.

Jack has a romantic, quixotic kind of class to it. Think of masculine and exciting figures like Jack Kennedy, Jack Nicklaus, and Jack Nicholson. Amazon.com lists over 54,000 books involving the name Jack. Tom, Dick and Harry are all well below that number and Chuck lists out at a measly 6,500. If you Google "Jack" you get a cool eleven million hits.

Jack is epic, legendary: it was Jack, not Tom, who climbed that thorny beanstalk, Jack, not Dick, who risked his tooly-woo by jumping over that flaming candle stick. And would the world forever remember, "Brian the Ripper?" I don’t think so.

Can you imagine the epicurean thrill of a double bacon cheeseburger at a "Chuck in the Box?", or looking for that little prize in a box of "Cracker Joes?" Tossing back a stiff belt of "Bob Daniels?" In Las Vegas, who would sit down to wager a fortune at a "Black Jimmie Table?" Who would ever be described as "a Bill of all trades", who crushed the concrete with a "Dave hammer?" Hello!

Currently the most popular names for boys are Aiden, Ethan and (no kidding) Caden, (my spell checker just went kerflooy). In the top twenty you will not find William, Robert, Richard or John. However, more and more parents are christening their boys – you guessed it – Jack. On the popular name scale Jack was 166 in 1990. In 2006 it soared to the top 10 list.

Live with it you Aidens, Ethans and Cadens: it will always be that lucky devil Jack who gets to take that naughty little Jill up the hill. If you think otherwise you don’t know Jack.

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