As common as water

So my sister Jen is sick of her name. She is so frustrated with her normal unassuming name. She said that she may as well be called Jane Doe. She told me a funny/frustrating story about her name and I am going to share it  but first a little background.

She called my mom the other day and demanded to know who decided to name her Jennifer. Before she was born, they had almost decided to name her Kira. When she was born though, they decided she didn't look like a Kira, she looked like a Jennifer. Jennifer thinks that her name is boring and so common. She has had problems with her name for a long time.

It all started in kindergarten when there were 3 Jennifers in her class. At that age, they don't use your last name much so there was a lot of confusion and identity issues I'm sure.  The next time she had problems was in 6th grade. She was in the lunch line trying to pay for her food and the lunch lady informed her she didn't have any money in her account. She was embarrassed about holding up the line while she fixed the name issue with the lady.  There were 2 Jennifer Wards (apparently her name is so common that it is safe enough to plaster it all over the internet) at the 6th grade center. After all this hullabaloo with her name, in college there was another Jennifer Ward. She actually had an initial. A middle name would have helped Jennifer distinguish herself better but she doesn't have one. Jennifer L. Ward got all of Jennifer's emails.  She actually got a disgruntled email from this Jennifer asking her to tell people exactly how they should email her to get the right Jennifer.  Jen even got this Jennifer's transcripts mailed to her. On her own transcripts they had things that were dated and belonged with the other Jennifer. So confusing.  But wait, there is more. This next story is why my mom got the phone call.

Recently Jen and Cody sold their townhome.  The bank approved most of it but suddenly Jennifer was blacklisted.  There had been another Jennifer Ward that had committed bank fraud. They  froze the loan application until she could prove that she wasn't the same Jennifer Ward.  A simple social security number later, and everything was straightened out.  Now she feels like she should just go by her SSN so people won't get so confused. I told her that a ton of people would have 529 as their first name if we all went by our SSN numbers. She admitted defeat on that idea.  While she was calling mom to complain about all these annoying incidents in her life, my mom started singing her the go eat worms song. She then handed me the phone. Apparently I have more sympathy because I still have my uterus. Who knew?  I was laughing my guts out while Jen was explaining her aggravations while mom was singing about going to eat squirmy worms.

Don't tell Jen, but at Party Land I found some gummy earthworms I'm going to send her. She will laugh about it, then she will eat them on her pity pot. Seriously though, that girl is hilarious and I had such a fun time talking to her about all this.  She fervently told me that her baby WILL be named Jonabeetha (inside joke, she told Jon she was naming her baby after him) and that she would be unique and not have to go through the same torments that plain Jane Doe Jennifer Ward had to put up with her whole life.  I hope Jonabeetha has a sense of humor, she is going to need it to deal with her mom.