The Naming of Cats and Daughters

At some point in college, I read T.S Eliot's Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats. (I still don't know how to underline in Blogger. Anyone?) I remember really enjoying the book. I still have it and keep it at school with all of my books about cats. I have lots. The one part I loved the most in the book is called "The Naming of Cats." It talks about why a cat "must" have three names. Tonight when were saying goodnight, I thought about Joy's birth family. I had scary dream the other night. I dreamed that we were back in China and that I had to give Joy back to her biological mother. I was so relieved when I woke up. I do wonder about her birth family. I wonder if she has siblings. For some reason, I think she must look like her birth father. Of course, I have no idea. One thing I am certain of, is that her birth family must have given her a name, her first name. That name will never be known to us, or to her. Then, of course, she has the name that the orphanage gave to her, Yu Mei Zhi, her second name. Yu is the surname that most of the babies in the orphanage shared. Mei means beautiful and Zhi, intelligent. She knows her Chinese name, although I am sure I don't pronounce it quite right. Still, it is important to us and I want her to always feel as if it is something that belongs to her. We chose her legal (and third name), Joy Helen Ruppert, long before we ever met her. Joy because we like it and Helen, after my mother who passed away the spring before we met Joy. She knows this name of course, including her last name. She now knows all of our names, except for the kitty's. She is simply called Mao-Mao or Kitty. Which brings me back to Eliot's poem. Of a cat's three names, there is one that no one can ever know. It is the name that he calls himself. And, as far as Joy's three names go, there will always be the one that we can't know, the first one that she was called.