Merle Haggard is a name out of a morality play. And that's the kind of songs he sings.
Having a name some people thought of as feminine had turned Beverly Lamartine to building up his muscles in his youth, and they still bulged, hard as ingots in some places, now lost in others.
And for some reason, they called me Pete. My mother, who probably dug up the name Melvin from some romantic novel about Englishmen drinking tea, cringed at the Pete.
They're fine lads, but if it's Cade Calvert you're setting your cap after, why, 'tis the same with me.
Judd was a name associated with a certain measure of sternness, sobriety, though in fact we Mulvaney children were rarely scolded and even more rarely punished: Judson Andrew which is my baptismal name was a name of such dignity and aspiration I never came to feel it could be mine, only something borrowed like a Hallowe'en mask.