What’s in a Name?

I said I would name my child “Driftwood,” “Drifter” for short. I was only having fun.
“You should take this seriously, you may be a mother some day and it’ll be up to you
how your child turns out,” Jane said. We were in sixth grade.
I liked naming things back then. I had lists of names for horses, dogs, cats, even
parakeets. Even children. The possibilities in naming, in deciding how someone would be known, is a mysterious and important task.
Maybe Jane was right. I should have said “Avery” which means counselor, sage, wise. Or
“Brannon,” strong, or “Sasha,” the protector and helper of mankind. Or “Vito,” alive, life.
Instead, I named my son for his father. Wendell. Wanderer. A better name than one that
means “stricken with an incurable childhood illness that will slowly leach away his life until
there is nothing left but the miserable shell of a child for whom death is a blessing.”
Better than my own name, Dolores, woman of sorrows.