apparently, i'm now against original thought. or maybe i'm just in favor of cited plagiarism. in any event, i dedicate this to the finest barrel maker in know.

By Bob Levey

Friday, May 9, 2003; Page C09 The Washington Post

The first child. Every couple's passport into the human race.

A chance to dream and hope and plan and worry. A reminder to go to the movies while you still can.

Today, a blob on a sonogram. Tomorrow, a person.

But that person will need a name. And that decision can cause immense amounts of backing, filling, fiddling and fumbling.

Couples consult books, religious leaders, friends -- even (get a grip) their parents. But what it comes down to, very often, is simply the name that feels right.

Which is why I had an easy time when Cindy Matthews of Laurel rang me up the other day.

Cindy and her husband, Dick, are expecting Offspring Number One in early August. Cindy has had all the tests, and she knows she'll be delivering a boy.

She and Dick are considering the name Robert. Cindy was calling to ask me how it has felt to carry those six letters around on my back for lo these many years.

As I told Cindy, I generally carry only half that many. I'm Bob, almost all the time. The last time I was "Robert," the IRS was calling. May the tax folk take the hint and not call again for a very long time.

I'm such a Bob that I shed gales of tears when the Bank of Bethesda merged itself out of existence about 10 years ago.

Its ATMs were called 24-hour BOBs. If there was suddenly no market for a cash machine by that name, what did it say about the market for humans with that name?

We Bobs persevere, somehow. Still, as the poet might have said, something there is that doesn't love a Bob.

We are the nice guys. The you-can-count-on-us troops. An agreeable variety of human wallpaper. We are rarely slash-and-burn stars of adventure movies, or rock idols, or famous generals or centerfolds in Playgirl.

No president has ever been a Bob (nice try, Sen. Dole). But software is.

In 1995, when Microsoft wanted to name a new product that would balance your checkbook, provide homey personal advice and keep track of appointments, the company trotted out . . . "Microsoft Bob." Microsoft Rick wouldn't have had the same comfortable feel.

Or is that a cliche? Are all Bobs really what Mr. Hope and Mr. Goulet and Mr. Costas have led us to believe? Gallant, graceful, amusing, urbane?

I told Cindy that the answer was a resounding yes. How do I know? Because of the book that my friend Lyford fished out of the library at The Washington Post.

If you have to ask what Lyford's first name is, you've been asleep for the previous dozen paragraphs.

Bob the librarian provided me with a well-thumbed copy of "The Bob Book." Its subtitle: "A Celebration of the Ultimate OK Guy." After I had read Cindy Matthews a few selections, and she had stopped laughing, she said the question of what to name her baby was closed.

The book's authors, Bill Zehme and David Rensin, say that "life for guys named Bob is always a manageable task because they take everything in stride." Bobs "have absolutely nothing to prove; if they did, they'd call themselves Robert or Rob or Bobby."

And you can take us home to mother.

Bobs are "balding, steadfast, dependable, hard-working and have an aversion to gold neck chains," David Rensin writes. "Bob's the kind of nice guy most women want to marry, but they just don't know it."

As actor Bob Cummings is quoted as saying, "Being Bob means that almost everyone treats you as if they'd known you for years -- even if it's the first time they meet you."

Bob-dom means a simple approach to thorny questions.

For instance , Buffalo Bob Smith, the human foil to the famed TV puppet Howdy Doody, is quoted as saying that Bob is a "good boy's name -- better than Clarence, Oscar or Elmer."

Game show host Bob Eubanks says you can spell Bob backwards "and still get it right."

Even the famously convoluted troubador, Bob Dylan, finds a lesson in Bob-ness. Being a Bob means to him: "Don't do to someone something you wouldn't want them to do to you."

But we Bobs are not dullards devoid of wit. Try this bon mot, from humorist and commentator Bob Garfield:

"Being Bob means never having to say you're Solly."

In my case, being Bob means I'd better remember to return the book to Lyford or he will become a murderous Bob.

In the meantime, Cindy and Dick, congratulations on spawning a guy who will someday be able to say what Bob Winchester says in "The Bob Book."

Brother Winchester is a pizza deliverer in Murray, Ky. He's quoted as saying that he chose the nickname Bob "because it made me feel heroic."

I wouldn't say I felt that way when I decreed (after a spell as Robert F.) that Bob would be my byline. But Bob consumes three fewer characters. In the newspaper world, maybe that's a form of heroism after all.