Showing posts with label Nicknames. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Nicknames. Show all posts

Monday, August 17, 2015

Nicknames


His birth certificate said his name was Frederick.
The priest who baptized him called him Ferdinand.
His siblings called him Freddy.
As a teenager, he liked to drive fast - "going like Barney Oldfield," as the saying went back then - so his friends (and eventually his wife and her family) called him Barney.
At work he was Fred.
When he died in 1986, his tombstone read Fred R. Imwalle.
I just called him Dad.

Originally published by The Columbus Dispatch on August 17, 2015.