My friend Maggie and her boyfriend Grimur had a little Girl about 6 months ago, as weird and beautiful as her parents. I kept asking Maggie what her daughter’s name was, and she kept saying, we don’t know. And also: we’ll decide when the government needs us to! Granted, they are Icelandic, so basically they ONLY DO THINGS IF INSTRUCTED TO BY HIDDEN PEOPLE, or if compelled to do so by their art guts. They were so busy raising and marveling at her, that her name didn’t really seem to matter. Their little girl went nameless for I think something like 3 months before they settled on Myrra, something that both Americans and Icelanders could easily pronounce. I was thinking about Myrra and Maggie the other day as Morrison and I had our 8 millionth ‘what will we name our children‘ conversation. For us, that has been the easiest part, probably because we’ve had much time to discuss. It started the year before we got married as we floated in a desert hot Spring, poking around the names of our siblings and grandparents and musicians we liked. For going on four years now, we’ve known ****** and ****** and ******. Their names are so clear to us, and we repeat them sometimes, remind ourselves of them, like saying ***** and ***** and ****** will make them exist, before they do. Just as I’m trying to patiently allow myself to think about worst case scenarios, I’m trying to also think about the good ones. Like when ***** or ****** or ****** is grown, they might ask us someday, why did you name me *****? And we will smile and say, because we knew it was your name, long before we knew You.