I’ve never given much credence to results of “studies” on human social patterns. We’re just too complicated to fit into neat little boxes. However, the other day I learned of one such study which so accurately described me, I had to give it a closer look.
I mention this here because this is the sort of thing that can be used to add depth to the histories of families and characters in my writing.
The study was about birth order and the “middle child syndrome.” Now, “birth order” is not new to me; I heard about it a long time ago but never paid it any attention because, frankly, my family situation doesn’t really fit any common form.
Now that’s a first.
American life has its rituals. Some are small. Some are big. Some mark a transition from one age to the next. Some are trials by fire, ordeals designed to break us and leave us whimpering, lying in pools of our own sweat and tears.
Names are interesting. They are (in general) the one permanent thing about us that someone else has chosen. Our parents, knowing nothing about us, saddle us with these monikers, and we grow up with them. How do they change us? How might we have been different, had we been given a different name? And for those who change their names, why do they change them, what do they change to, and why did they pick the new name?
Kurt R.A. Giambastiani 