I have had a minor fixation on acronyms lately. A person’s initials make up their own personal acronym – part of their own personal Identity. You must admit however, that some folks have more interesting initials than others. For example, I noticed that my colleague Dennis Mastin’s initials are DAM. I saw it on his briefcase. Just think, he can say DAM without cursing. He’s only referring to himself.

I grew up in the era when important people, Democrats at least, were known by their initials. Headlines would often blare out JFK, RFK, LBJ or MLK. But nowadays initials are not in vogue. Have you ever heard of WJC or GHWB or GWB? I suppose some initials are more poetic than others.

My wife Claudia’s initials kind of match her given name: CLD. That somehow got transformed into a pet name – CLDhopper or Clodhopper. How’s that for a name to call a pretty lady? But even though the initials suggest it, she is definitely not COLD.

Some people have just just a few initials; others have many. We made sure that each of our kids had precisely three: LMD, HAD, DMD, AMD, ESD, RJD and HMD.

But my dad has only two: KD. He has no middle name. In contrast, a friend of mine from Holland has initials EHHAMB, standing for “Eduardus Hendricus Hubertus Antonius Maria Bodden.” We just call him Ed!

Some people, though are shortchanged. Think of the famous folks who have only one name. Maybe Nene (the basketball player with only one name) shouldn’t feel too bad because he just has one initial. He has plenty of money to make up for it.

I still rue that day I didn’t register my own initials as MGD.com. I probably could have been paid a tidy sum of money by Miller Brewing Company for the use of my initials. But they beat me to the punch. However, you can still reach me through my i-name =MGD. Miller hasn’t come calling for that. Yet.

I’m sure you have your own examples of cool initials. But I challenge you to match my cousin. His name (really) is Glen Odell Dixon. Imagine the initials he put on his briefcase! Or how he signs memos! Or what he could put on his voice mail message! But alas, he didn’t register GOD.com.

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