Christening The Prattler

One reason I haven't had a blog is because I am intimidated by the overwhelming task of picking a decent title for it. If you don't have a great name for a blog, there's not much hope it will be awesome. I tend to think that a blog says a lot about a person, or a lot about the type of things they will blog about; naming a blog isn't just picking out a string of words that sound clever or profound or poetic; it's the christening of a label for yourself, a way to assign some kind of networld identity. So I guess you could say that I didn't know what I wanted my blogger identity to be. As if my real life self isn't hard enough to figure out.

(I tried really hard not to use the word "avatar" in that paragraph because I didn't want anyone to start thinking about computer animated blue-skinned creatures. But now you are thinking it anyway).

After much rumination, I came out with a few options for a blog title:

1. "Brevity Is the Soul of Wit (in 145 characters or less)"
This blog's entries would all be 145 characters or less, which, if you were wondering, is the length of a text message. But alas, I found it difficult to contain my ramblings to such concision.

2. "Raconteur: because life's fiction is more interesting than fact"
A raconteur is a storyteller. But then I realized that people might expect me to be an amazing storyteller if I had this title. Also, I didn't like the alliteration. Rebecca Raconteur.

3. I auditioned some of my favorite words to maybe form a blog around them: enumerate, trepidation, sanguine, quotidian, nuance, and claptrap. But all these words sound a bit... erudite, except in the case of claptrap which sounds like an incurable disease (it's not).

Hmm... I was not quite satisfied. So I tabled the idea of a blog for a while.

Then, on a day much like any other day, I found myself talking longer than people want to listen. It happens, and every time it does, I think of the phrase "prattling away." The word "prattle" is one of my favorite words. It reminds me of a section from Les Miserables when Jean Valjean takes Cosette into his keeping after her mother dies:

"She called him 'father' and knew him by no other name. He spent hours in watching her dress and undress her doll and listening to her prattle. From this moment life appeared to him full of interest; men seemed to him good and just; he no longer reproached anyone in his thoughts, and perceived no reason he should not live to a great age, now that this child loved him."

I love to prattle. If a person is prattling, it seems to suggest a general contentedness in life that there is time and attention for talking about whatever is on their mind, regardless of importance or interest. When a person prattles, it usually means that they are NOT complaining, disclosing, or yelling. It's not serious, but it's not not-serious. It's mundane prattle.

Therefore, I christen thee, blog, THE PRATTLER. May thou live up to thy potential.