When I was in law school, I hit the jackpot.  While other students were bogged down in very serious federal judicial clerkship internships, researching fine points of tax law and social security, I clerked for the Judge who was handling the Philadelphia mob trial, the Stanfa case (hmm, now that I think about it, maybe that wasn’t exactly the jackpot – my contemporaries all ended up making big bucks at law firms, and here I am, an economically challenged public defender, not quite a Powerball winner).   It was a RICO case, murder and racketeering, not like the Sopranos or the Godfather, but true Philly style, the Keystone Cops of goodfellas, featuring a bomb called the Egg that repeatedly failed to detonate and a hitman named Santa Claus.  But, it wasn’t all murder, failed murders and mayhem; most of the evidence consisted of business owners, large and small, testifying about shakedowns, threats, and harassment.

            There were eight defendants on trial, one of whom was represented by a man and a woman team.  The woman took a backseat, and it was weeks into the trial before she was given a witness to cross exam.  And, in true “throw the token girl a bone” fashion, she didn’t even get a good witness, not a snitch, not an eyewitness to any of the slayings, but one of the business owners, the owner of Delilah’s Den, a strip club in Philadelphia, and New Jersey.  On direct, the man basically testified about who would come to his business to collect the money, and how much he paid, the nitty gritty of the shakedown.  At the end his direct testimony, the woman attorney, I don’t even remember her name anymore, approached the podium to cross the witness.  This was an exciting moment for me – by that time, I was already seeing myself as a criminal defense attorney, a field not exactly crowded with women in 1995.  I thought, now she’s going to show them, here it is – the big moment – and the question she asked? “Sir, isn’t it true, that your establishment is named after a wanton woman in the Bible, and you named it after her because of her lies and wicked ways?”  Huh? WTF?  After all this time of waiting to get in the game, that’s your question?  Of course there was an objection, and the Judge was about to sustain it, when the witness, said, “No, no, I want to answer it.  You see, it’s really a clever name.  See, in New Jersey, we’re located on Delilah Road, so the name, see, it tells everyone where to find us, and the Den, see, it tells them we got girls.  Delilah’s Den – we got girls on Delilah Road.” 

            I learned two things – a. never ask a question you don’t know the answer to, and b. not just a picture, but a name, can be worth a thousand words.

            So, when I was trying to come up with a name for this website, I was trying to think of a name that would have the value of a photograph.  And, I came up with Lemontine. 

Lemontine?

            I wanted a name like Seinfeld – but not something that was about nothing, something that could be about anything.  Back in October, my boyfriend and I played the name game when we brought home our feisty Boston Terrier puppy.  We named her Liz Lemon – 30 Rock is our favorite show, we like Tina Fey and we weren’t going to name her Sarah Palin, and we liked walking around the house saying, “LIZ LEMON,” like Oprah did on her guest spot on 30 Rock.  My mom thought we were crazy, “That show is going to get cancelled, and then you’ll be stuck with that name.”  But, I love lemons.  To me, you squeeze a lemon, and you get lemonade, not Lemon Law, sour lemons, or as the Urban Dictionary defines “Lemontine,” “crap stains in your pants.”  (A definition I completely reject, as I’m sure William Safire would too!)  To me, lemons are everything refreshing, clean, and a la 30 Rock, something a bit ridiculous in a good way.

A few days after we brought Lemon home, my niece, Danielle, a very precocious five year old, came for a visit, and started calling her “Liz Lemontine.”  Why are you calling her Lemontine? I asked.  She shrugged, “Because.”

            And, then, at the Golden Globes, Tina Fey, in her acceptance speech, thanked her toddler daughter, for all of the funnies she has said that have worked their way into the show, like “I want to go to there.”

            I want to go to there – anywhere. 

            So, in my brand of stream of consciousness, I put Liz Lemontine (and the notion that I could put our puppy in the header) and “I want to go to there,” together – I can go anywhere, write about anything, and perhaps, if I’m lucky, with a little imagination akin to a child – Lemontines.