I Hate Julius!

There are names that send shivers down my spine every time I hear them. Names that induce pure, abysmal hatred. Names that are a punishment. Names as punishments have become very fashionable in recent years – or I’m getting on in years…I’m still thinking about it.

I hate Julius. It’s such a trendy new German old humanist name. If you’re called Julius, you’re an idiot. Or rather: becomes one. Like the gentleman, like the gentlewoman. Julius’ parents are always of the “I have a son, I don’t need a gun licence to be a control freak” variety. Every Julius less makes me happy that Germany is dying out.

Julius usually has one of those husky harnesses for small children round his torso. Even in the sandpit, you never know. Julius’ mum usually has – to put it discreetly – a very sonorous voice. A voice that can only be used for one job. But Julius’ mum is a philistine through and through, so she will never become a dominatrix. Unbridled control freaks who take their fears for a walk with reins. You should deliberately cycle into the lead.

A nagging voice cuts through the early summer pedestrian zone. Julius’ mother pushes a pram in front of her and directs Julius, who is cycling 20 metres ahead, acoustically. A car is approaching. She hears it five minutes before I do. Loud screeching: “Julius, look out! There’s an aaaaaaauto coming! Drive carefully to the left”. The car races past at 2 km/h, a hair’s breadth of five metres to the side.

People learn to multitask when they are seven. But only if they are challenged and allowed to make mistakes. Four-year-old Julius was never allowed to make mistakes. He will reach onto the hot hob ten times in his life, and that is something I highly credit him with as rebelliousness against his dictator. But there’s no use having such a mother hen for a mum.

In the frenzy of freedom, Julius falls backwards onto his face, looking at Dominamama. Now he screams. His Dominamama even louder. I wait a moment to see if she calls a sanker. But she doesn’t. She makes a pig of Julius because he’s fallen into the middle of a pile of dogs. I want to rub it in her face. For all her cowardice, carelessness and the stench of death that creeps out of every one of her damned movements.

Life is dangerous. If it’s not, you generate arseholes. Julius will surely become Caesar one day.