Dear Kid,

High school soccer season has begun. And by “begun” I mean there was a scrimmage last night.

We played at Turpin, which is southeast of exactly nowhere.

I’m pretty sure the location moved while we were there because the drive home was significantly shorter than the arduous journey we took to get there in the first place.

Turpin (according to Dictionary.com) refers to an English highwayman named Richard Turpin.

The Turpin High School probably didn’t get its name from a thief who died a couple of hundred years ago, but their website didn’t give a more relevant explanation.

So, being the kind of mom I am, I will provide a little more information. (This explanation of course is coming from the unimpeachable source of I’m-making-it-up.)

There are quite a few conflicting theories as to where the name Turpin came from. Scholars have debated the origin for years, but evidence has finally come to light to Explain All.

How adorable is this little penguin? DearKidLoveMom.comThe first theory is that Turpin stands for Township Urchins Revere Penguins In Nests. This is of course pure nonsense as one doesn’t need to be an urchin to adore penguins and who uses the word “urchin” these days anyway (unless they are referring to sea urchins and we’re more than a few miles from the sea).

The second theory is that someone named Turpin died where the school is built. Which is probable but gory and one can see why they don’t brag about it on the website.

Another theory is that someone named Turpin gave a lot of money and/or land to the district, which sounds better but is highly unlikely since nothing else in the area is named Turpin and because they would have been screaming it in BIG LETTERS on the website if that were the case. (Mr. Donald P. Turpin, though he didn’t have children of his own, left his fortune of $14.17 to build this school on the family farm…).

The most logical explanation is that one day a terrapin fell out of the sky, landed on that very spot, and in the confusion of trying to explain what it was doing up in the sky in the first place lost a few of the more important letters in its name. Those letters T, R, P, and N mixed with letters already in the soil in that area and a school sprouted up.

One must be careful of having too little education. One must also be careful of having too much education.

I must be careful to go get some more coffee.

Love, Mom