Conversation at the Feedstore

                                                   (Graphic by Frooty.)

The other evening, after church, I had to run to the feedstore.  We needed bread, milk, sweet feed and rice bran.  As I walked up to the counter with my milk and bread, there was a man checking out with a 6-pack of beer, Josh the clerk and Walter.....the boy on feed loading duty.  

Walter said, "Hey, you're Pete's mama, aren't you?"  As I was opening my mouth to answer, Josh said, "No, she's Pete's wife" with a mischievous grin on his face.  Walter gave him a look like "no joke Sherlock!"  In keeping with their fun, I said, "Yes, actually I am both.....Pete's wife and Pete's mama."  At which point the man with the 6-pack's eyes got big and round and he sort of "humphed" to himself. 

So I said, You know actually neither one of them are named Pete.  It's just a nickname.  At which point Josh said, "You are kidding!  My daddy ain't really a Pete....it's just his nickname, too!!"  And he told me his daddy's real name, which had nothing to do with Pete or Peter.  But said he didn't know why. 

So, I said,  "Pete, my hubby is nicknamed Pete because his mother wanted to name him Peter after Peter Gunn the detective on TV at the time.  She thought he was so handsome.  But his father and his grandmother, put another name on the birth certificate.  Hazel didn't like it much.....so she called her boy Peter Gunn, which got changed and shortened along the way to Pete.  Bubba is nicknamed Pete, because when he was about 3 years old he pointed to his daddy and said 'Pete.  Big Pete.'  and he pointed to himself and said 'Pete.  I'm Little Pete.'  And it stuck."  Then I told them their real names.  They do have the same initials.  Andthe same middle name.  But even Big Pete didn't care much for his first name, so he chose my daddy's name for Lil' Pete's first name.

All of this is sometimes handy.  When someone calls our house, we immediately know if they know my husband personally or not by what name they ask for.  And sometimes it creates some absurdity.  Take one of Bubba's middle school yearbooks for example.  He had not cared much for how his first picture had turned out.  So the day they did make up pictures, he went in and had his made again.  When the year book was published, there on the same page were two pictures of Bubba!  One with his real name underneath, dressed in one shirt.  The other with Pete underneath, dressed in another shirt.  I told him, here's your ticket to getting away with murder........your mysterious identical twin!  Even now he receives mail from the armed forces, colleges, credit cards, etc. in both names.

As a humorous side note:  AOL Spell Check has no idea what to do with "Feedstore."