The name search started with a list of the top baby names for girls in 1927. Once I had a shortlist of names that might suit her, I considered the nicknames one could derive from each of them. Naturally, we (my brother and sis-in-law helped) tried the candidates with her surname, Underwood, to make sure it had a nice ring to it. ‘Margaret’ made the short list but wasn’t one of my favorites. ‘Maggie’ seemed nice though. It didn’t take long for me to derive ‘Magpie’ from Maggie and then I knew I had a strong candidacy for a name and nickname pairing!
One of my early reading books featured a magpie. As a result I’ve long enjoyed magpies themselves as well as how the word feels on my tongue. Magpie was a nice fit because she’s black, has some shiny bits (magpies are reportedly attracted to shiny things, a misnomer as it turns out, but still a pervasive stereotype), and (as my brother dryly pointed out) she’s very noisy! The more I thought about Magpies (their intelligence, curiosity, and chatty nature) the more I liked it - but I decided I’d better sleep on it.
The next morning Benjamin and I were talking about her and he mentioned something about slugs. I stopped him. Slugs? He informed me that ‘slugs’ are the metal-bits that strike the page with each keystroke. I stopped him again and whipped out my phone for a quick internet search. Are slugs part of a magpie’s diet? They are. That’s when I knew I had it. She’s black, shiny, chatty, and has a belly full of slugs!
This is my Maggie, my Magpie, my new-old friend. I’m anticipating so many wonderful adventures with her. I can’t wait to keep spending time together generating all sorts of creative and wonderful things to bless others with and make the world a little bit better place, one typed page at a time.
