A rose by any other name....

My name is Brae. I know. It's different. Many people tell me it's beautiful, and usually ask me to repeat it several times.

It's not hard. Not if you understand the English language. You've heard the preschool poem "When two vowels go walking, the first one does the talking. It makes a sound just like it's name, the second one goes to sleep."

So, with that in mind, one should know it's pronounced "Bray" Long A, silent E.

All three of my years in junior high school, I had the same teacher for 4 different classes. He was my science teacher for 3 years, and my last year there, he was also my home room teacher. Every single day for 3 years and 4 classes, Mr. Sherratt would call roll and over the chatter of students, he would say "Brea?" (which he pronounced Bree-uh)

I would answer with "It's Br-ay"

Once, somewhere in 8th grade, I stopped answering his call for "Bree-uh", and simply ignored him, thinking I'd teach him a lesson.

Instead, my parents got a phone call stating that I hadn't been in class for over a week, and I was the one who learned the lesson.

From that point on, i just answered "Here."

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This Saturday, which was too long and awful to go into much detail about, we were walking around Wal-mart while our car was serviced, and Mahone, dressed, as usual, in his superman cape, was flying much too far ahead of us for my comfort. He also has this knack for being under people's feet and on top of everything else at the most inopportune times.

So, I broke out the middle name.

"Mahone Raphael!" my son did a loop, one hand at his waist, the other in a fist out in front of him. But he behaved.

Brandon mentioned, with a smirk, that he could always tell how long he was grounded by how many names his mom called him by.

"Brandon!" meant "Be right back, guys."

"Brandon Craig!" meant "See ya in an hour guys."

"Brandon Johnson Craig!" meant "See ya tomorrow guys."

"Brandon David Johnson Craig!" meant "see ya next week."

"Brandon David DAMN-IT Johnson Craig!" meant "See ya in AT LEAST a month, guys- and that's if I live through it."

My dad usually called me "Miss Lee" (Lee being my middle name) when he had something to talk to me about, but it wasn't that serious, but I don't think my parents ever used my name at all when they were angry at me.

Now a days, I have a nickname for my husband. He hates it. He always has, but it's just always been what I call him. He teases that he knows when I'm angry, because it's the only time I call him something affectionate, like "honey." Otherwise, i just call him "Punk."

In retaliation, he has developed a nickname for me, and calls me "Brat." If he calls me "Brae" then I know he is serious.

So, the question posed is- would a rose by any other name smell as sweet? Yes. But how many names do you think Romeo's mom called him by when she found out he had murdered Tybalt, married a girl who was supposed to be his enemy, and then killed himself on her death bed? Hm. I wonder.