Little Stories: The Bogus Middle Initial
How my second grade teacher opened a big can of worms by trying to modify my name. Plus a new Inconspicuous News Roundup, and more!
Little Stories, focusing on memories from my youth, is a recurring feature of Inconspicuous Consumption. You can see more Little Stories here.
In my recent post about why I prefer odd numbers over even numbers, I mentioned that I don’t have a middle name (as confirmed on my birth certificate, shown above). That led to an interesting situation when I was in second grade.
It was early in the school year and our teacher, Miss Pearson, distributed a new textbook to all the students. Phonics, maybe, or social studies — something like that. The inside front cover had one of those little registries where you were supposed to write your name, and Miss Pearson told us all to write our first name, middle initial, and last name in the appropriate spot.
I should have just written “Paul Lukas” and left it at that. But instead I raised my hand and said, “What if you don’t have a middle initial?”