What's With the Name?

Have you ever tried to choose a name for yourself that you KNOW will identify you for a long time? It’s really nerve-racking—at least it is for me! One reason it took me SO LONG to create this blog was that I COULD NOT come up with any creative name ideas that I REALLY liked! Finally, last night, I thought of one!

A year after I got home from my mission, I worked as a camp counselor at Oakcrest LDS Girls camp. We all had to come up with a nick name for ourselves. My sister, Lisa, said I should be Speedy because at the time I was engaged to be married and my last name would soon be Gonzalez…get it? Speedy Gonzalez! Ha ha ha! I felt kind of funny choosing a name because of a BOY, but I couldn’t come up with anything else, and after we shared our camp names with the other staff members and EVERYONE started CALLING me “Speedy,” I got used to it and it stuck! I even had some fellow counselors give me Speedy Gonzalez PEZ dispensers! (I still have those!)

While I was getting ready to spend my summer at Oakcrest, I came across a scripture that REALLY SOLD ME on the name Speedy. I was reading in the Book of Mormon about Alma the Younger. He was trying to teach the gospel to the people in the city of Ammonihah and they firmly rejected his message, verbally abused him, spit on him, and cast him out of their city. Alma 8:14 says that Alma was “weighed down with sorrow” as he left the city and then an angel appeared to him. It was the SAME ANGEL that called him to repentance when he was younger and making trouble for the church. This time, the angel told him to RETURN to Ammonihah. I LOVE Alma 8:18! It says, “…after Alma had received his message from the angel of the Lord he RETURNED SPEEDILY to the land of Ammonihah.” I thought THAT should be my message for the girls at camp! We should be ready to SPEEDILY do ANYTHING the Lord asked us to do, even when it is SUPER HARD! I don’t know if I did a very good job of getting that message across to the girls, but I DEFINITELY never forgot that lesson! Now, whenever anyone calls me “Speedy” I am FILLED with joy! That was one of the GREATEST times in my life and a time when I felt like I was the BEST I had ever been!

Now, you know where the “Speedy” came from, the NEXT thing you need to understand is that I LOVE THE THESAURUS! Ever since we learned how to use it in 6th grade, I’ve LOVED looking up words and coming up with LOTS of DIFFERENT ways of saying the SAME thing! Especially now that I can do it on the computer REALLY FAST! “Crowd” was just another way to say a group or bunch of people!

I’m hoping this blog will not only help me be better at keeping a “journal” (I’ve always struggled with that!), but I hope it is a place where my family and friends and I can keep in touch and support and strengthen one another! There are SO MANY PEOPLE I have met in my life who have REALLY influenced me FOR GOOD and whom I REALLY LOVE! So, when you are invited to read my blog, I hope you know that YOU are someone important to me!

P.S. I’ll REALLY TRY to not write such LONG blogs EVERY TIME! My goal is to update this ONCE A WEEK! So, now that I’ve posted my goals on the internet, maybe I’ll feel enough pressure to FOLLOW THROUGH!