"Child, to say the very thing you really mean, the whole of it, nothing more or less or other than what you really mean; that's the whole art and joy of words."

Thursday, May 6, 2010

Cosette Has a Name!

I'm thinking this blog is going to become a Davenport Family Update Transit of Information blog. Hopefully I can put some interesting info up regularly, especially once baby Cosette comes and I'm back on my feet (or not on my feet and a little restless).

Firstly, we have named our baby girl Cosette Marie. And yes, I meant to type it out! We had been keeping our name choice a secret for about 5 months for two reasons: We could change it if we wanted, and it was fun to be sneaky. Well, reason number one become very valuable to me when about a month ago I fessed up to Keith that I really didn't love the name we had chosen and had been calling the Kicking Kid for months. I just didn't.

For a while I loved the name Evelyn, the old-style way. Then I recalled the hauntingly beautiful store Eveline from James Joyce's Dubliners, and I vividly remembered my senior-year English teacher telling us to say her name Eve-Line or Eve-Lyn, because she's Irish, Joyce is Irish, and that's how the Irish like it. Eve-Lyn sounded awesome to me, beautiful and unique. So we made it Evelyn, pronounced Eve-Lyn. Somewhere along the way, though, I started hearing Keith say "Evil" every time he called our baby by name. And I was bothered. Eventually I couldn't handle it anymore and broke his heart by casting "Evelyn" out the window. But, I mean, come on...Evil just shouldn't be tolerated.

Cosette was on my top 5 list for quite a while. Keith, however, wasn't in love. It took some living with and convincing on my part, and finally one morning, Keith said, "So let's name her Cosette." And I was happy.

Where the name came from, though, I'm not sure. I think I was inadvertently influenced by my reading selections of Les Mis over the years of Englishness and literature-learning, although I couldn't have told you Cosette is the daughter of Jean Valjean...that is, before I was reminded of it.

Marie is my middle name...that's where that came from.

So anyways, other Davenport happenings:

Olivet graduates this weekend: David, Kent, and Andrea are undergrads, and Tim with an MBA. Busy, busy! Graduating from college ourselves seems like ages ago to Keith and me. College itself also seems like another world, in which we only possibly actually lived or perhaps only made up. We do miss our college friends so much though. And some professors. And some classes :)

No more work for me after next week. I'm cashing in my lattes at Caribou Coffee after 1 year and 7 months to wait impatiently for Cosette to come see me and then take care of her. Now this means many things to us Davenports, but mainly it means that we will be relying on the Providence of God now more than ever, and we will be hopefully looking for an additional job for Keith that he can work joyously and not reluctantly. It means rearranging things financially. And it means that I'm finished with yet another "Just a Job" job and can look forward to a new job in the future that really invigorates me, or to more at-home motherhood, whichever befalls me.

Max & Sadie, our adoring 2-year-old furry fluffies, say hi to the world through the blog as well. They want you to know that they are doing well. Sadie Catahoula is excited for the baby to come so she can have yet another Davenport to snuggle and mother. She also wants everyone to know that she has settled down (*some*) but will still jump on you and love you if/when you come to visit us because she just downright adores you already. Max Dog, on the other hand, wants you to know he feels apathetic about the whole baby thing. However, if you come to visit, he promises to sit with you in the green chair and do nothing all day.

That's about all for now. 5 more weeks till the due date!