"... and now, a word from Dr. Agonwagon..." “Many people do dumb things in their teenage years, but most have the sense not to cast them in concrete, which they then have to drag around for the rest of their lives... "At sixteen, I got married for the first time. My then-husband-to-be and I thought that the woman should not take the man's last name, so we decided to choose a new last name. As I recall, somewhere in there we looked at one of those 'One Thousand Names for the Baby' books, and discovered that our old first names had meanings we did not agree with (it was the late sixties, we did not agree with much). (I mean, criminy, I was only 15 1/2 years older than this picture, left—way too young to make a decision that would follow me my whole life!)  yeah, but how much can 'youthful folly' excuse? "His old first name, Mark, meant 'the warrior'; we were anti-war. My old first name, Ellen, meant 'the Queen'; we were anti-authoritarian. He came up with the new first names for us, Crispin, for him, meaning 'the curly-headed one'; Crescent for me, meaning 'the growing' (once erroneously reported in a newspaper interview as meaning 'the growth'!).  "The wedding drew nearer. We still hadn't come up with a new last name. One day, after trying and discarding several possibilities, I said, 'Maybe we're taking ourselves too seriously, maybe we should pick something completely frivolous.' He said, 'Like what?' I said, 'Oh, um, uh, like Dragonwagon.' "Thus we became Crescent and Crispin Dragonwagon. If I had had any idea how many countless thousands of times I would have to explain this ridiculous name, I would have chosen something a lot less flashy. But by the time I realized how long the remainder of my days might be, and that I'd be pulling that durned name around like a ball-and- chain, I already had a couple of books out and the start of a professional reputation.

Dear Mr. Wagon.. "But, I will say ill say it's a great children's book name(that's another thing I do besides write cookbooks, is write children's books); kids love saying it. Plus, I enjoy seeing how various mailing list computers maim it. Over the years, I’ve gotten letters beginning, 'Dear Mr. Wagon,' and solicitations addressed to Dr. Agonwagon. "I certainly can't blame anyone for saying "Hunh?" when they first hear it, or asking me how I got this name, though I am really, really tired of telling the whole dumb story, or for writing me off as a flake, at least until they get to know me. But, it’s my own fault.  neccesary (maybe) pig-headedness "There's also this: decisions you make early in your life also look different as you mature. The retelling above was how it looked to me at the time. Now, as I look back from my mid-fifties (I was born in 1952), I think that at that point, another strong factor was that I did not want to get by on my parents' credit or identity. I was a writer; they were both writers, and semi-famous ones. If I used their name, I think I felt, unconsciously, as if I was using their reputations and identities, instead of forming one of my own.  ”At that early age, it's essential to make a marked break from your parents in some way. So in some ways, I respect the pig-headedness and idealism of my sixteen-year-old self, even while I am exasperated with her... because now I also sometimes think, wasn't being a professional freelance writer hard enough, did you have to make it harder on yourself? "   "But the truth is, once people know me, they don't even notice my weird name anymore. post-script "By the way, Crispin and I divorced many years ago, in 1973, after having separated in 1971 (big surprise, right?).  "In 1978 I wed Ned Shank, to whom I remained happily, passionately, and interestingly married, for 20-plus years, until the terrible day at the end of November, 2000, when he went out on his customary afternoon bicycle ride and was struck by an ongoing vehicle. ”As I write these words in 2007, it seems to me fortunate that what lies between our present and the future is always hidden by an impermeable opaque curtain.With Ned, II had 23 years of shared life with a partner I adored, and who adored me – the kind of relationship many people don’t even get to have for fifteen minutes. That I underwent that brutal process called grief very slowly - and I did - that I was only able to compost Ned’s loss over a period of years (I don’t think anyone “gets over” grief) is just part and parcel of how much I loved the lives the two of us had together … how much fun on the whole, to say nothing of the more serious stuff,  we had.

Sorrow, joy, meaning & cornbread "And yes, Ned and I  did eat an awful lot of cornbread toegther (we also served it, to thousands of people, because partt of our life adventure was owning and running an inn called Dairy Hollow House for eighteen years, and serving brunch to 1200 people at the presidential inauguration of one of our guests, Bill Clinton). “This story, my story after Ned's death,  does have a happy… well, you can’t say happy ending, because, still being in the thick of things, I appear to be very far from ending (though as Ned proved, you never know). But, I have a good life now, and a happy one, rich and full and surprising. That it  is not the life I thought I would have,  and that it was seared by sorrow on the way back through this slow return to joy,  does not make it any less good now. In fact, maybe makes it more so... though I still wouldn't chose Ned's loss, ever ever ever. But since such seismic shifts are part of life whether or not we chose them, and whether or not they happen for a reason, we still get to make meaning out of them... or not. And that is our choice. And I chose meaning, resilience, and joy - and I encourage you to, as well.  "And yes, I do think cornbread is part of all these things. Or it has been, and is,  for me. (Picture, left: an older, and hopefully wiser, Dragon). ”You’d think by changing my name to Crescent Dragonwagon, a dumb-ass and labor-intensive name if there ever was one, and seeing how that unfolded over the years I might have learned something about how wholly unpredictable life is.  "And I guess I have learned something. And that is that every day is astonishing, and that coming in and out of what looks like balance as the ground shifts is actually its own kind of balance. “   ♦