My eighth grade English teacher instilled a love of the "right" name in me.  I suppose I never realized how much she influenced me in this way until we started house hunting in Virginia. Coming from San Antonio, all of our streets have a theme.  I have been spoiled by logical, creative, thematic names.  I imagined the street names in Virginia would be incredibly exciting, considering all the history of the area. However I have been surprised.  The real estate agents have been laughing at my perspective of street names and this has become a running joke.

     After all, who wants to live on Tongue Ave. (Yes, there is really a street with that name.)  Hmmm....

     We drove by Lauriann Woods subdivision with the main street named Lauriann.  Wow!  Wouldn't that be cool, to live on a street that bears my first and middle name.?

     I found a house on a street with my son's name...too bad, that was a short sale.

     I found a street named Tapestry. Now that would be funny if I lived on Tapestry Ave. That's the name of our incredible classical history/literature curriculum and I am a moderator for some Tapestry yahoo groups.  

     On a map I found Lafayette Crossing! What is that?  A subdivision? A town?  The site of Lafayette crossing a creek?

     Then we drove by Saratoga Heights with the main road named General George Washington. Now that looked exciting! I asked if there was  Benedict Arnold street. No, the agent said none of the other streets have anything to do with General Washington or Saratoga. At least I did find two houses for sale on General George Washington Drive. However the agent couldn't bring up a current listing of the first...it sort of disappeared. The second was a short sale. Sounds traitorous to me.

     We finally found a house on Gunston Hall Drive.  How unromantic. After all, what is a Gunston Hall?  Is it a place where guns are stored? Nevertheless, I decided to get over it since the floor plan was incredible and we put an offer on it. That night as we drove up I95, I saw brown sign (as in historical landmark) that said Gunston Hall, next exit. Wait!  Wasn't that the name of the street where the house is that we put the offer on?  "Yes," my daughter exclaimed!  "Wow! I can't believe it! I wonder what happened there?"  My daughter suggested that Lafayette slept there. Hmmmm, that's likely. He visited everyone in America!

     Later that night I googled Gunston Hall and discovered George Mason lived there! He lived on the peninsula south of Mount Vernon. He was a friend and mentor I think to George Washington. He wrote the Virginia Declaration of Rights, which is featured in Revolutionary City at Colonial Williamsburg. The burgesses in Virginia met in Williamsburg and agreed to independence from England and then sent delegates off to the Constitutional Congress to agree on independence. The Virginia Declaration of Rights was the forerunner to the Declaration of Independence. You hear about it all the time in Colonial Williamsburg.  And guess who were guests at Gunston Hall?  George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin and Lafayette (of course)!

     While we were putting the offer on the house, we got to meet our friendly finance officer, Rick. He asked for my cell phone number and when he heard it he exclaimed, "You're from San Antonio!"  He then told me about his dad who lived out there near Max Lucado's church.  I said that was Oak Hills Church. Rick got more excited. He said his dad lived across from there in the Dominian.  Oh that's where a lot of the San Antonio Spurs live! He told me David Robinson lived there. Oh I knew that! Everyone knows that! He asked if I knew the name of the street he lived on.  No. Admiral Way!  (His nickname was "The Admiral" because he attended the Naval Academy.)  I laughed and told Rick that street names are really important in San Antonio and he agreed. The agent was laughing because of all my previous comments about street names.  Then Rick told me to guess David's house number. Okay it had to be the number on his jersey. I said the number and the agent was laughing and laughing while Rick told me I was correct.   

     Alas, someone else got the Gunston Hall house. I am really sad about that. That would have been too cool to tell people I live on Gunston Hall Dr. While I was looking up the floorplan, I discovered the builder is located on Lafayette Circle. sigh  Oh well. We have an offer on another house...although I don't have a clue what that street name means. Hmmm....