Atypical Anglos

In Search of the Perfect Band Name: Atypical Anglos

My nieces and nephews, as well as my own progeny, are going to have vastly different experiences in elementary school. Said formative experiences are going to create a lifetime of pain for the women of my family.

My nephews have ‘normal’ names: Ben, Corey, Sam, and Will. My Nieces are Alta and Osie, and my daughter’s name is Ksenia.

You might wonder how I’m defining normal. Many in educational circles, psychology, and many other fields have taken stabs at what normal is. The answers are complicated, comprehensible only to people who hold advanced degrees in a specialized field of study.

I’m a simple man: I say normal is whatever Bill Gates doesn’t underline in red. Alta, unlike her two cousins, escapes the red spellcheck mark of shame by virtue of the popular local ski resort. However, she lives with her family in Ohio, and you can’t snowboard there anyway, so she will probably get her unhealthy dose of torment.

Some parents choose family names for their children as a conscious attempt to connect the past to the future. As my wife spent time in Russia, she chose a perfectly normal Russian name for our daughter. Some parents choose the name a child will take with her throughout life on the basis of a deeper meaning. Others choose a name because they like the sound.

My wife tells me that women have been known to hear the word myconium in the hospital, and like the sound so much they name their child accordingly. This is unfortunate as it refers to the product of a child’s first bowel movement. The torment that child will undergo until she turns eighteen and can legally change her name will be unspeakable.

Which leads me to my point; parents should name their child with one thought foremost in their mind: what name will prevent my child from being made fun of in elementary school? Once you have found the answer, you have found the name.

Let me give you an example. My name is Thomas. You wouldn’t know it because in elementary school the other kids quickly learned to refer to me by the British spelling (Thom), and add an extra s at the end. You get the picture, and it ain’t pretty. A little foresight on my parent’s part would have prevented me from getting a name so easily turned into ridicule.

Some people might say my elementary school social woes were driven by poor social skills, but I’m pretty sure it was mostly the name. The two most popular boys in my grade, Wade and Doug, had perfect names (hence the popularity).

Granted, Wade is a little different than we were used to, but he came from California (I think), and the name conjured images of the ocean, something that was cool to little boys because man-eating sharks lived there. Anyone with a name like Wade obviously had survived many attacks and lived to tell about it. You just don’t make fun of a kid with a name like that.

Doug’s name could be easily changed into Dig-Doug, which was one of the first computer games. As the childhood obesity epidemic has shown us, video games are sacred and holy to most children. No boy in his right mind would make fun of a name that sounds like a video game.

In light of these recent revelations, I’ve been thinking of starting a band. We could call ourselves “Atypical Anglos”. As I am lacking in musical skill and creativity, we will be a cover band. I am choosing the name purely to minimize the likelihood of being asked to play ‘Freebird’ as an encore.

This is a good thing, as the guitar part is hard. However, come to think of it, who is the typical ‘white-bread’ musician? John Denver? Pete Seeger? Bob Dylan? John Lennon? In my moments of honesty, I’ve got a better shot at playing some three chord folk song than I ever will of rocking out on a Jimi Hendrix tune.

Bill Gates and his spell-checker goons don’t like Jimi’s name, and underline it in red. Why does corporate America not recognize one of the Rock Gods? Atypical Anglos is a stupid band name anyway. Why do we have to draw distinctions based on race? Why can’t we just all hang out and rock out together? Why can’t we “let Jimi come on over” as he asks in _______? On the other hand, I have a better shot at playing a ‘typical’ Anglo folk-rock song. Maybe I need to continue searching for the perfect band name.