Can this Turtle Be Saved?

This is a true story.

Clyde the desert turtle had been part of Bob’s family for 12 years, and in the divorce settlement last year, Bob got custody of Clyde and his wife got the two kids. It has never really clear to me if there was an actual court battle over custody, because the obvious but un-askable question is, “Who won?” At any rate, Bob loves Clyde like a child.

My friend Judy was turtle-sitting recently for Clyde while Bob, now Judy’s fiancé, was out of town for the weekend. On Saturday morning Judy noticed that Clyde was dangerously close to the edge of the pool. (This story takes place in California, where, Judy assures me, all homes have pools.) Being a desert turtle, Clyde did not swim, so Judy carefully carried him to the bushes at the edge of the yard, as far from the pool as possible.

Thus discharging her turtle-tending tasks, Judy went through her Saturday ritual of doing her nails and hair, then left for lunch and shopping with her mother.

When she got back, you guessed it: Clyde was at the bottom of the pool. Judy became hysterical. Not hysterical enough to dive in, of course (she had just done her hair, remember), but hysterical enough to run out into the street shrieking, “Help! Help! Clyde’s in the bottom of the pool!” But no one was around (a fact for which I think Judy should be grateful). 

One can only guess the urgency and fear that gripped Judy in those moments. It reminds me of the time when Lassie got her foot caught in a coon trap, and Timmy had to run to the barn to get help, but no one was at the barn.

Finding no help at the barn, so to speak, Judy ran to a neighboring house. There she found a teenager who offered his services (don’t ever say today’s teens aren’t willing to lend a hand), and they raced back to the pool, where the teen dove in and brought up a limp, dead Clyde.

Judy knew how much Clyde meant to Bob, and she knew how to do CPR. Love can motivate us to do strange things. So, you guessed it, she turned Clyde over on his back and started pressing rhythmically. But, alas, after several minutes of pumping, there were no signs of revival.

Judy decided drastic steps were called for. She instructed the helpful teenager to hold open Clyde’s mouth, and she began blowing into it. Soon tiny bubbles started coming out of his nose, er, nose holes. More cardiopulmonary compressions. More blowing. Unbelievably, Clyde started breathing on his own! No doubt his little turtle heart started, too, but really, how can you tell?

But all was not well. Clyde’s back legs hung limp. Now Judy asked herself the heartbreaking question, would Clyde have been better off dead than living as a paraplegic? And even worse, what if he was brain-damaged? She faced the horrible fact that the moments lost while she ran looking for someone else to dive in might have been the difference between an able-bodied and a disabled Clyde.

But this story has a happy ending, at least for Clyde. Judy called the turtle doctor (remember, this takes place in California) and, as instructed, wrapped Clyde in blankets. When he came out of shock, he had full use of his legs and full mental capacity, Judy reports. (Another un-askable question: how can you tell if a turtle has full mental capacity?)

Judy told Bob the whole story, fully expecting a shower of gratitude and something akin to adoration for resuscitating a desert turtle. Bob, however, was more miffed that she hadn’t immediately dived in to save poor Clyde. So, the ending for Judy and Bob remains to be seen.

Baby's Last Name

In 1977 it was pretty radical for a married couple not to give a baby the father’s name. Actually, it still is. But Tom and I were feminists, and we recognized that a patrinominal system reflects a patriarchal society, which reflects a sexist society, which we did not support. So we decided our baby did not necessarily have to have his name. Our small decision did not change society, as I’m sure you all know, but back to my story. 

We did know one couple, our friends Bob and Linda, who also planned to buck the father’s-name system, but their plan was not being tested by an actual pregnancy. Their plan was that any girl children would have Linda’s surname, and boys would have Bob’s. But Tom and I didn’t want to go in that direction and let sex determine the name. As it turned out for Bob and Linda (for those of you who like to tie up loose threads), they did later carry out their plan. Conveniently, they had one boy and one girl.

We considered combining our names. Goode and Wiseman were, after all, not bad contenders for a merger. Sure, Wisegoode sucked, but Goodman sounded fine. However, we felt Goodman, or even Goodman, would sacrifice the integrity of both our names. The integrity of a name was just a vague notion to me at the time, but in the years since I’ve developed a clearer sense that a name does have an integrity—a wholeness and a clarity that should not be distorted.

We thought about hyphenation. Goode-Wiseman? Wiseman-Goode? But what would happen when a Wiseman-Goode married a Nowinski-Nykoruk, and then the Wiseman-Goode-Nowinski-Nykoruk married a Baker-VerPorter-Waeckerle-Heitman? This clearly could not end well.

Using my name as Baby’s middle name was a possibility we considered. There were plenty of models for such use of family names. Franklin Delano Roosevelt. John Fitzgerald Kennedy. Lyndon Baines Johnson. Richard Milhous Nixon. But I really didn’t want to saddle Baby with having to become President.

Ultimately, we decided we would name one child Goode and one Wiseman. Naturally we intended to have only two children, doing our part toward zero population growth.

Then the friends started weighing in: A kid without the father’s name would make people question whether we were really married. We would be sentencing a child to playground ridicule about being a bastard. Everyone would think the kids were step-siblings, thrown together from two divorces. Our children would have lifelong identity problems. Different names would provide a breeding ground for divisiveness in our family, would worsen sibling rivalry, would lead to each child’s emotionally aligning more with one parent than the other. 

You have to put this in the perspective of 1977, mind, long before the term “blended family” came into common parlance. Also, this was before 40.2% (I just checked) was the proportion of babies being born to unmarried women. And, really, hardly any of them are called bastards. (OK, I didn’t check on that, but you hardly ever hear that name being yelled out on the Metro.)

Ignoring our friends, Tom and I stuck by our plan to divvy up the surnames of our planned two kids. But whose name would go to this first baby? In the end, it was the opposition from our friends that convinced us to give Baby my name—Wiseman. Our thinking was that if we chose Tom’s name for the Baby 1, we would make people happy, but all hell would break loose when we switched to Wiseman for Baby 2. Conversely, by using Wiseman first, the opposition would feel relieved when we named the second child Goode. (“Tom and Marian have finally come to their senses!”) Or, failing that, the outrage would have been spent because of Baby Wiseman, and they would no longer care. 

Once Rachel Wiseman arrived, I was astonished by the pleasure it gave me that she had my name. What exactly was this feeling? It was more than the extraordinary love I felt, more than the bond of motherhood. It was a feeling of great satisfaction connected specifically to her having my name. I had never suspected such a feeling even existed in the universe of human emotions. Is this what men have felt for generations? All the patriarchs of history? Small wonder the patrinominal system is so entrenched. 

None of the repercussions portended by our friends came true. Sure, Tom was Mr. Wiseman to all of her teachers, but he never objected. 

One time—she just have been eight or nine—Rachel told me that she and her best friend had been talking about what their names might be when they got married. I give myself great credit for my self-control when I heard this. I did not start shrieking, “You’ll change your name over my dead body!! You think you’re going to cave in to male dominance and set feminism back 30 years?!! Do you think your father and I gave you your name for nothing?!”

No. I was calm. Serene, even. “You do realize, don’t you, honey, that you don’t have to change your name?” With great objectivity I pointed out that it was her choice. I conceded that many women still do take their husband’s name. And I’m quite certain I did not roll my eyes when I said that, though I admit my tone might have hinted that those poor, unenlightened souls were to be pitied. I reassured her that it would be up to her when the time came.

To my friends I said, “If she changes her name, I’ll kill her.”

Keeping My Name

When I got married—the first time, in 1974—I didn’t change my name. Not taking the husband’s name was a newer concept then, and it wouldn’t actually have occurred to me if Tom (first husband Tom, not current husband Tom) hadn’t suggested it.

Tom’s family was supportive to a fault. Example: For our wedding present, his mother embroidered a set of sheets, with “His” and “Hers” nested amid the beautiful flowers and curlicues on the pillowcases. Some time after we opened her gift, she sought me out privately to say, in her quiet, unassuming way, “I hope the ‘his’ and ‘hers’ is OK on the pillowcases. I knew to stay away from ‘Mr.’ and ‘Mrs.,’ but I wasn’t absolutely sure about ‘his’ and ‘hers.’ Tears filled my eyes as I hugged and reassured her. How thoughtful to be sensitive about such a thing. How hilarious to wonder about ‘his’ and ‘hers.’

My own mother, though 10 years younger than Tom’s, was less hip, or perhaps just less agreeable. She knew I was retaining “Wiseman,” but after the marriage her weekly letters, formerly just to me, now came to both of us, with the envelope addressed to “Mr. and Mrs. Tom Goode.” The kind interpretation is that in 1974 Mom did not know how to address an envelope to a married couple with different surnames, since neither Emily Post nor Ann Landers had as yet directed the world on how to do it. That’s setting aside the possible interpretation that Mom was being passive-aggressive.

I didn’t want to confront her about it—afraid to learn she had disapproved of my decision, perhaps, but also, it must be said, because I avoided confrontation of any kind. (This was before therapy, obviously.) Tom, however, had no such misgivings and became increasingly irritated by the incorrectly addressed letters.

The turning point came when my birthday present arrived addressed to “Mrs. Tom Goode.” I didn’t like it but was willing to let it go (note the “before therapy” comment, above). Not so, Tom. He said if I didn’t talk to Mom he was going to send the present back, with a note that there was no such person as Mrs. Tom Goode. (I was just beginning to realize, in that alarming first-year-of-marriage way, that Tom was pretty bull-headed about some things.) His confronting my mother, or, more likely, accosting her, was out of the question, of course.

So, I had to tell my mother to address me by my actual name of Marian Wiseman. She complied immediately, and it was so easy! No questions asked, no resistance, no difficulties of any kind. If I had realized then how effective assertive behavior was, I might have avoided those years of therapy.

I was surprised recently to find out how uncommon it is, still, for women to keep their birth name at marriage: only 20% of women do so; another 10% or so use a hyphenated name or some other modified version of their birth name. But there is apparently a small trend toward maintaining one’s own name. Some commentators believe that the rise of social media is contributing to this trend, as women face inconveniences in changing online accounts or realize that their Facebook or Linked-In histories and identities are lost if they create an identity under a new name.

For me, I have never once regretted my decision to keep my own name when I married in 1974, or when I married again in 2000, for that matter. Ah, one name. Permanently.

I would love to hear your views on this issue, whether you are married or not, or female or not. 

The Big Wheel

After Rachel was born, Mom and Dad visited every Tuesday afternoon. They came to our house in Lansing after tending to Grandma Myrtie in Grand Ledge—buying groceries and taking her to the doctor or the bank. They brought us vegetables from their garden, and often a rhubarb pie, sometimes peach, and when Tom came home we all had supper together. It was a nice routine.

On those Tuesdays Mom often presented me with something she had bought at a garage sale. The quilted bedspread I later dyed purple. A pressure cooker. The wind-up swing for baby Rachel. A nylon winter jacket—navy, with an orange and yellow striped collar. Mom paid 50¢ for it, and as things turned out, it was my only winter jacket for the next 10 years.

Rachel was a toddler when Mom brought us a Big Wheel. It wasn’t an expensive brand-name Big Wheel, but a somewhat flimsy imitation. And something was out of kilter in the front wheel—it didn’t steer very well and it wouldn’t go very fast.

I was a regular at garage sales myself, as Tom's book scout. One day I found a brand-name Big Wheel, bright red and yellow, sturdy, and in excellent condition. I thought the $4 price was high, but new Big Wheels were $28, and the one from Mom just wasn't satisfactory. I paid the $4 and took it home. What a difference! Rachel pedaled it furiously down the sidewalk, steering it easily into the Thompson’s driveway.

Next Monday I placed the faux Big Wheel at the curb to be picked up with the other trash. Midmorning, the doorbell interrupted my editing. At the front door stood an African American man—early thirties, I’d say—about my age. Nice looking. Wearing a suit. His car stood at the curb.

“I noticed the Big Wheel out front with the trash, and I wondered if it would be all right if I took it. I know some kids who would like to have it.”

I was embarrassed. He thought I could afford to throw out Big Wheels. I lived in a nice house on a tree-lined street. I was white. He thought I was one of the “have’s,” discarding Big Wheels right and left. How could he know I wore a winter jacket that cost 50¢?

“Oh, well, sure. That’s fine.” Words came tumbling out. Gushing out. “I wouldn't really be throwing it out, but it’s got a bad wheel. It works, but not very well. And I bought a better one. At a garage sale, I mean, not a new one. That one out there was from a garage sale, too, actually. My mother bought it for my daughter.” I was talking faster and faster. “But the new one I bought is better. I mean, not new, but newer than that one. Not broken, I mean. At a garage sale. It was just $4. That one out front does work, though. But it sort of steers funny. I wouldn't even be throwing it out but I found that other one, and there was no need to have two.” I took a breath. “You're more than welcome to take it.”

He thanked me and left.

I closed the door and watched from the window as he put the toy in the trunk of his car. I burst into tears. I lived in a nice house on a tree-lined street, and there were little kids who had nothing, and he was willing to stop and ask if he could take my trash. And I was white and he was black. Was this scene much different from the ones—how did I know them, from movies? from books?—in which the black man comes—obsequious, to the back door—and asks if there is some work he could do for a meal, and the white woman prepares a plate of food and gives it to him, feeling smug and pleased with her generosity? Had anything in changed? Would it ever change?

I did not feel smug, and I wept. I wept to think that I had become a “have.” I wept for myself, and for that man, and for those little children who would ride the broken Big Wheel. 

Baby Names

I'm loving the resurgence of old-fashioned, long-gone, not-liked-for-a-long-time names for baby girls. Grace. Lillian. Violet.

How is the name game played?
I think we all come to the realization at some point that we don't like a name because of an association from childhood--or even later. It's often a kid in our class, sometimes a relative, sometimes a famous person. Both Lloyd and a Floyd were with me all through grade school, and I'll just say that no baby of mine would ever have either of those names.

The opposite is true as well. To me, Elizabeth is a wonderful name because of Beth in Little Women. It almost became my Rachel's middle name, but I wanted Suzanne instead--because of Suzie Stebbins, my best friend in grades 1-3, before she moved across town.

Some parents want novelty. Mercury. Chastity. Dweezil. I knew a kid named Talon. His parents told me he was named for the zipper brand (if you look at the zipper tab on a pair of Levis, chances are it says Talon). Yeah. Really.

Some parents want to wait until a baby is born before choosing a name, on the basis that the name has to fit the baby's personality. Or something. I hold that names just fit people. They grow into them or something. I didn't meet Cushing Dolbeare until she was in her 70s, and I had never heard of the name Cushing. It was an old family name. Unusual, no? Cushing was one of the most unforgettable people I've ever met, even though I knew her for only a few years. Warm. Decisive. A groundbreaking leader in her field (low-income housing). I always think of Cushing when I think of people matching their name somehow.

Going, going, gone
So, what to name your baby? I've done a little checking and can report that these names have been on a downward slope over the last 100+ years: Helen, Ruth, Mildred, Florence, Gertrude, Bertha, Gladys, Beulah, Edna.

For example:

• Helen was the 2nd most popular name in 1900, but was 404th  in 2014. 
• Ethel was 8th in 1900, 176th in 1950, and not even in the top 500 in 2014.

But I hold out hope for some of them. Of course, there's just no hope (nor should there be) for Bertha, what with the Big Bertha cannon and all. But can't you picture little Millie and little Gertie? Ruth is a lovely name. And there is no reason in the world that Helen shouldn't make a resurgence. You who are going to have babies can make a difference! 

The come-back kids

Some names that dipped low at mid-19th century have already surged:

• Grace: Dropped from 17th in 1900 to 183rd in 1950, but in 2014 was the 21st most popular name in all of the United States!
• Lillian: In 1900 she was hot at #10, but dropped to 155th by 1950. In 2015? 25th! Go, Lilly!
• Hazel: Not as strong a showing as the first two, but a name to watch. In 1900, Hazel was the 19th most popular name for baby girls, but she dropped way down to 219th in 1950. She's picking up speed now, though: in 2014 Hazel was the 107th most popular name. I'm personally rooting for her because we have a baby Hazel in the family.

Clearly the most out-of-control come-back names are Emma and Emily. 

• Emma was 13th in 1900 and dropped to 154th in 1950. But something happened after the turn of the century. Emma has been in the top 3 names chosen for babies since 2003 and was #1 in 2014.
• Emily had a similar resurgence but actually might be on the way out. She had a 12-year run (1996-2007) as the most popular name for girls, but she dropped to 3rd in 2008, and now she's down to 7th. Sigh. Poor Emily.

My personal opinion is that Emma and Emily have had a good run and should just get over themselves now. 

Tell me about it

I'd love to hear from you--how you chose a baby's name, how you got your own name and whether you think it fits. That kind of thing. 

Seeing all of the United States

I want to see the world, but I haven't even seen all of the United States yet! I've been to 46 states, many of them several times, of course. Still left to visit: Idaho, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Hawaii. I hope to see Mount Rushmore in South Dakota and visit Teddy Roosevelt National Park in North Dakota. In Hawaii, everything beckons, of course. 

A little "problem" I have with my US travel is my relatively recent hobby of touring state capitols. I decided about 8-10 years ago that it would be a great goal to visit all of the capitols. I love this hobby!  I posted pictures on this blog after my visit to the capitols in Kentucky and West Virginia. 

At first I checked off a capitol if I just stopped and took an exterior photo. But now I've decided it doesn't count if I don't actually go through it.

I think my count for state capitols I have toured is now at 20. Thus my problem. I have four states left to visit to complete my visit-all-50-states project, but 30 state capitols left to visit. I'm thinking I should put up a US map with green pins representing the state capitols I have not toured, and also yellow pins in the four states not yet visited. 


My most recent capitol tour was Maryland's: Last summer I took a day trip to Annapolis with my friend Linda and went through it. I always learn so much history--little things I never would have known. Like the fact that George Washington resigned as commander in chief of the Continental Army in the Maryland Senate chamber. On display is a copy of his letter, and it is fascinating. 

With goals of seeing the world and finishing off the US capitols, I have a travel conundrum, because in addition to visiting new places, I want to go back to all of the places where I had great experiences. What's a girl to do? How do I choose where to travel?

Hell, I can't even decide which places to go to in Washington.

So many places to see in the world!

I love travel. I mean going to new places. Definitely not traveling--the process of getting there.

For many years I have had a world map above my desk, with red push pins marking the places I have been, and blue ones for places to visit. Wonderful are the days when I get to replace a blue pin with a red one. 

I've tried to be at least a little realistic with the blue pins--prioritizing the places I want to visit. For instance, the map has only four blue pins for the entire continent of Africa. Not because I don't want to go to more, believe me. 

My Africa blue pins are stuck in Victoria Falls, Kenya, South Africa, and Egypt. I also want to visit Morocco and Ghana, but you can't just have an entire continent littered with blue push pins. Regarding Victoria Falls--I know I'll have to visit some countries to get there, but I can never remember which ones. Zimbabwe? Mainly I just want to see the falls, because of a travelogue I saw when I was 10.

Victoria Falls

Even though most of my foreign travel has been in Europe, there are so many places I still haven't visited: Edinburgh, Nice, Krakow. I could go on. Sigh. 

We haven't planned a vacation for this year yet. Africa? South America? Maybe just stay in the United States, where I also have lots of blue pins. Any nominations for our 2016 travel?