The Name

Why FloweringW? Silly girl that I am, "Flower" is a nickname bestowed upon me by my brother and sister when I was a frosh in college.

Yes, I'm the little one tugging on my underpants.

So Anne and Brad and I were having a bite at Braum's (best ice cream & burger in the midwest) in OKC the summer of '88. Our parents had just moved back from CA, I was starting college in Iowa, and Anne & Brad were helping with the move. I figured it was the perfect opportunity for me to introduce myself in Iowa with a new nickname--makes sense right?

Margaret can be a long name, and everyone likes to shorten it to something (Madge, Marg, Peg, Maggie, Marge, Margie, Meg, NutMeg--you get the picture). So I asked them what they thought. Silence. And then--FLOWER! There was much laughter (I didn't think it was so funny at the time), and that was it. Flower is a silly little nickname that is used, by them, on the occasion that I've crossed over into a world that doesn't have as much to do with reality as it does with my own imagination.

Otherwise, my family calls me Meg. Funny thing, that's what my new friends in Iowa ended up calling me too.

Anne says "Well, the way I remember the naming was that we were moving TO California and were sitting around talking about what was to become of you since you would now be attending high school there. One of us said that you would probably turn into some crazy hippy chick named Flower...I think if I was going to name you something before you moved to Iowa it would have been Corny or Daisy.

Brad says: "The way I remember it is that there was a stampeding herd of rhinoceroseseses and we sought shelter in a nearby cave which happened to be full of bats. As we munched on deep-fried bats (I had my Fry Daddy and a long extension cord) we discussed Meg's pending move to Iowa for college, where she would be a California girl amongst the corn-fed Iowaians - and that she would be some kind of granola-eating kook in their eyes and that they would call her "Flower." ...The rhino part may not be right - perhaps hippopotomausussesess? But I'm sticking by the rest."