JD is my riding lawnmower.
I named it JD because it’s a John
Deere. I could have named it Alice, but jumping on an Alice and whipping it
around the backyard in the middle of the night just didn’t seem appropriate.
But now that I think about it, jumping
on JD doesn't sound all that good, either.
Oh well. We humans are a strange lot; spending
all our money on diets and exercise machines, eating fast food when slow food
is so much better, and giving human names to inanimate objects because we’d
much rather have “Cindy” helping us trim the hedges than some smelly old weedeater.
Well, let me tell you what I think of
the whole mess:
It’s bollocks.
(Bollocks is a Middle English word
meaning “testicles,” often used figuratively by the British as a noun to mean
“nonsense.” Sentence: “Naming a lawnmower JD is a bunch of bollocks.” Which it
is, and I didn’t. I lied.)
I can go along with naming a dog
"Rover" or “Skip” because they’re living creatures that can be
trained to fetch or play dead. But giving a Black and Decker Citrus Juicer with
an Easy-Pour Spout the name of "Bob" or “Luanne” is just asking for
trouble.
Sure, Willie Nelson had his
"Trigger"; B.B. King played his "Lucille." There’s "Herbie"
the Love Bug; Stephen King's "Christine"; The Green Hornet’s
"Black Beauty"; and of course The Batmobile.
But let me be perfectly clear about
something: I will NOT give my “things” a name.
And that includes naming my motorcycle.
I know I'm bucking the trend of
modern-day motorcycle adventurers, but two wheels, an engine and an exhaust
system doesn't deserve (in my humble opinion) an affectionate name like
“Madeline” or “Southern Belle” – a name that it will learn to hate as it grows
older, wishing that it was named "Apollo" or "Sidewinder."
You spend days and days trying to find
just the perfect name for your bike, looking through all the “A Million and One
Great Baby Motorcycle Names” help books you can find, and what do you get in
return? A self-absorbed chrome-covered machine that never misses a chance to
criticize your decision with, "Why couldn't Mad Dog Barganski be me owner.
He gave his bike a COOL name" or "Someday I'm going to change my name
to something that YOU should have named me in the first place."
You, in turn, respond with, "When
you get a bit older and you’re living by yourself in some dusty spare-parts
corner of some two-bit motorcycle and ATV shop, you can name yourself anything
you want."
How can something you’ve spent time and
energy and money and polishing rags on be so cruel, you ask yourself? Where did
I go wrong? I tried to be a loving, supportive motorcycle owner, putting in the
premium fuel while all the other owners pump the low-grade junk fuel into their
machines.
He should be grateful that I gave him a
name at all. Has even thought about all the poor motorcycles in China who never
even get a name? How they live on the streets, uncovered, watching their resell
value plummet without even knowing they HAD a resell value?
“One day, when you’re older, you’ll
thank me for your name and the time I put into giving it to you,” you say.
"I will not! I hate you,” your ungrateful
little cruiser screams. “I wish you never bought me."
Oh, the foul language that bubbles up
to your lips, just wanting to be set free, but you refrain because you’re a
good motorcycle owner, you’ve read all the expert books about having a bike,
you know that what is said in the heat of the moment will come back to bite you
in the buttocks threefold – so you just grin and bear it, because that’s all you can
do.
Notice, I said YOU.
Not ME.
The raw emotions of naming a motorcycle are just too much for me to handle.
No comments:
Post a Comment