One year we organized a beauty pageant. I have no idea what that might have had to do with farming, unless we were attempting to recruit beautiful young women to drive tractors and ride horses. And, while I don't remember very much about that event I do remember the name of the winner: Twinkle Andress.
Daryl fell in love with the name Twinkle and decided that day that if he ever had a daughter her name would be Twinkle Greer. I, on the other hand, was not so sold on that name for our daughter. I have forgotten the story that the original Twinkle told us about her name, but we had no such story and the name didn't fit in with our other children's names.
How would it sound to say, "I'd like you to meet my children, Ben, David, and .....Twinkle."
Daryl was serious, though, and I tried to find names that would work with Twinkle.
Twinkle Ann. Twinkle Louise. Mary Twinkle. I was trying.
As it happened, though, when we had our little girl, level heads prevailed and we gave our daughter two family names: Jacqueline, after my dad, Jack, and Anne, after me.
Jackie grew up knowing that her "almost" name was Twinkle. In fact, Twinkle was one of her nicknames. Other people heard about that and started calling her "Twinks." Twinks was part of her email address for years and sometimes, even now, a friend at church will ask me how Twinks is doing.
It seemed a shame to have a name be such a part of our lives and never have a family member wear it. So, when we named our cat, Twinkle was an easy choice for us all.
The original Twinkle grew up from her beauty pageant days and became a wife, mother, business owner, and....a politician.
When I saw her name on the ballot today I did the natural thing:
I voted for Twinkle!
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