The Origin of a Name

My family has been known to be a little quirky at times. Like when I tell people that as a child I couldn't wait until Friday nights so we could all gather in the living room to dance to Lawrence Welk. Didn't everyone have this kind of togetherness as a family? Didn't everyone's mother arrange the birth order of her children to match the boy/girl, boy/girl, boy/girl ratio and create built-in dance partners? Maybe that's a story for another time...

One of our other quirks is that we didn't grow up using our real names. Oh, in public we managed to be presentable, but at home it was another story. My oldest brother is Goose, followed by my sister Jo-Babe, my brother Humpy (so unfortunate), my sister Spook and my brother Hoody. And then there's me, Gitz. Or Gitzen Girl. Or Gitzy-mama. Or Fritz. You get the idea.

 
Apparently when I was a wee-babe my dad could get me to laugh by tickling my neck while saying the stand-by "Gitzy Gitzy Goo." And I thereafter became his Gitzen Girl. I think at some point Gitz turned to Fritz when they realized I walked everywhere on my tippy-toes dancing and performing for anyone who was willing to pretend like they were interested, and "fritzing about" became my favorite pastime. And while he may have dropped the "Gitzy Gitzy Goo" phrase, my dad's favorite game is still trying to corral little children while "getting their neckers" and tickling their neck until they beg for mercy or beg for more.

I do have a more endearing nickname from my dad ... which I was teased endlessly for my freshman year in college as I hit the button on my answering machine and it started saying, "Hey, just checking to see how my Babydoll is doing..." You never outgrow a name like that, do you?

And for the record, my brother's nickname didn't start out as Humpy. He fell a lot as a kid and they called him Humpty for Humpty Dumpty. And apparently no one around felt the need to mention that taking the "t" out left it with a whole other meaning. Like I said, we were perfectly respectable in public...