I live in the suburbs of Oklahoma City.  One of the things here that I’ve always just kind of ignored is the way that the neighborhoods in suburbia or “additions” as we call them here are named.  There seem to be two major themes.  “nature” and “man made shit”.  Not always, but usually, there’s a verb or an adjective preceding a noun.  Which “theme” the addition was named after is pretty obvious.  Names like “Rolling Brook” clearly falls in the “nature” theme, while “Olde Towne” (which I remember as an empty field as recently as my teens) fits more solidly in the “shit we built” theme.

I don’t know where these neighborhood names come from.  There may be a big book of pre-approved names to choose from, the individual developers may have to pull something out of their ass and hope the city council goes for it.  All I know is they never ask ME what I’d name an addition given free reign to do so.  Probably because they know I think it would be just funny as hell if Mr. & Mrs. Uptight found “the perfect house” (Oh, dear, it’s so beautiful!  We simply MUST live here!)  in a neighborhood officially named “Menses Falls”.  “They” (who the fuck are “they” anyway?) might not like my first choices, but I can promise it’d be a lot of fun and their friends would never forget the name of their neighborhood.

I’d like to name a neighborhood after it was fully developed and all the good suburbanites were living their nice suburban lives.  I’d hire a private eye or two to get a little look at what’s “really” going on in the neighborhood.  Not that it’s all that damn hard a job.  I wouldn’t hire them for long, pay them much or meet them at home where they could steal my liquor.  Then I could go with “Backstabbing Farms” or “Philandering Estates” possibly “Huffing Acres”, or “Abusive Heights”.

Having lived in my community since the second grade in 1974 (yes, it’s been confirmed, I’m an old fucker) I can also name some of the new pop up additions based on things I’ve seen or done on the property either as a kid, teen or young adult.  Names like “Wounded Quail”, “Copulating Cattle”, “Choking Donkey”, “Stagnant Creek” and “Former Dump Site” are all viable options for a few of places I can think of right off the top of my head.  Not only that, It would give a little bit of history to that particular place on the planet.  (“Dude, you remember that one time when we snuck under the fence with our pellet guns and accidently shot that cow in the eye?”  “Yeah! I think that place has a bunch of 3/4 million dollar houses there now.  Let’s see… “Puss Eye Hills”… That’s what that place is called now.”  “Huh… No Shit?”)

It doesn’t really matter anyway.  People just have this weird need to put things in a box and label not only the box, but everything in the box as well.  Perhaps if people were to lighten up a little bit and not worry about what the labels said, but what the contents of the box were they would realize that it is possible to live in a neighborhood called “Open Horse Artery”, and spend more time caring FOR the family and friends, instead of throwing away a lot of time caring what they LOOK LIKE to the outside world.

It’s a pipe dream, I know.  But in the spirit of being the change I want to see, I’m going to have some street signs made.  This winter in the dark of night, I’m going to rename my street to Jizim Trail…