Strange Name
Once upon a time, after a couple had been married a few years, they decided
to have a baby, and they had a baby boy. They were having trouble coming up
with a name, because neither of them wanted the baby named after them, in fact,
they didn't want their baby named after anybody. They wanted their baby to have
a name that nobody ever had, so they finally agreed to name him "Odd."
After they told the doctor and nurses the name that they had chosen for their
baby boy, they all had quite a laugh. But the laughter never stopped, because
once little Odd started to school, he was teased about his name from first grade,
until he graduated. Still the teasing and laughter continued, poor Odd was teased
through out his college years, until he graduated.
Once Odd graduated from college, and started his chosen career in life, Odd
assumed his colleagues at his work place would be mature enough that he would
no longer be teased about his name. But he was wrong, the teasing and laughter
went on until Odd finally retired from his career.
After Odd had retired, he thought that he'd finally escaped the teasing about
his name, but he was wrong again. When people would see him around town, they
would say things like, hey Odd, is your last name Ball by chance? Or, are you
the odd man out? Then the laughter.
Finally, after Odd had become very old and feeble and lying on his death bed
with his wife at his side, he spoke to his wife and said, I would like to ask
you a big favor dear. His wife ask, what would that be dear? And Odd said, as
you know, I've went through all kinds of torment and humiliation all of my life,
because of my miserable name. So please don't let them put my name on my headstone,
just the date of my birth, and the date of my passing. Don't even put my last
name on it, because I don't want anybody to know that it's me. His wife reluctantly
honored his request, and his headstone only had the date of his birth, and the
date of his passing.
But to this day, as people are strolling through the cemetery, and see the
headstone with the two dates and no name, they say, "Isn't that odd?"
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