What's in a name?

Names are a funny thing. I say this not just because I happen to have an unusual and yes, I admit, quirky last name, but because names signify so many different things about our world.

Names are often associated with reputation, position or ethnic background, and they are also among the first words spoken upon meeting someone we don't know. As I am new to Moses Lake, having just moved from Tacoma, I have had the privilege of introducing myself and becoming acquainted with people in my new community.

For those of you I have met, the name 'Hornberger' is perhaps familiar and creates an image in your mind of the person to whom the name belongs. But for many of you, the name does not mean much because no memory of that person (me), has been created. So I would like to take a moment and share a little bit about myself. Then you might have a better idea of who I am that goes beyond a name you see every day in the paper.

Like many of you, I too came from a small town. Located on the tip of the Kitsap Peninsula, across from Whidbey Island, Hansville, Wash., was my childhood stomping grounds. It is here that I had my first clown birthday party and ran naked through the sprinkler's in my family's backyard during the summer months in 80 degree weather, which was and still is considered "hot" in the western part of the state.

Three years later, in 1985 my younger sister, Beth, was born, making dress up and playing Barbies much more entertaining with a companion at my side! Now, 22 years later, having graduated from college and supposedly all "growed" up, my hobbies have changed quite a bit. I traded in my pink flower dress for a suit; my Barbies for a pen and paper to pursue one of my life's passion: writing.

I don't know where it will take me, but then again that is the exciting part. What I do know is that there is so much more to people and places besides a name and a reputation. When people ask me why I came to Moses Lake, a place considered by some to be a dot on the map in the middle of the desert, I reply, "because it is a place of new friendships and new opportunity. It is a place I now call home."