第7章

星期三

亲爱的长腿叔叔：

我改名字了。

在学校名单上我仍叫乔若莎，不过在其他场合我就叫茱蒂了。要为自己取一个小名实在很悲哀，不是吗？不过茱蒂也不是我凭空捏造的。在弗莱迪·柏金斯能流利地讲话前，他都是那样叫我的。

我希望李皮太太以后在给小宝宝取名字时能多用用她的聪明才智。她从电话簿上选择我们的姓氏——您只要翻开第一页就会看到亚伯特。而名字则随便在哪儿看到就拿来用了，乔若莎是她从一块墓碑上看到的。我一直都很讨厌这名字，不过我挺喜欢茱蒂的。它听上去有点傻气，就像是那种有着一双蓝眼睛，甜甜的，被家人宠坏，一辈子都不用烦恼的女孩子的名字——跟我完全不同的女孩子。这样不是很好吗？不管我犯了什么错，都没人说是我的家人把我惯坏的。不过假装一下也挺好玩的。以后写信请写给茱蒂。

（晚餐铃响了，再见。）

Wednesday

Dear Daddy-Long-Legs,

I've changed my name.

I'm still"Jerusha"in the catalogue, but I'm'Judy'everywhere else. It's really too bad, isn't it, to have to give yourself the only pet name you ever had?I didn't quite make up the Judy though.That's what Freddy Perkins used to call me before he could talk plainly.

I wish Mrs. Lippett would use a little more ingenuity about choosing babies'names.She gets the last names out of the telephone book-you'll find Abbott on the first page-and she picks the Christian names up anywhere;she got Jerusha from a tombstone.I've always hated it;but I rather like Judy.It's such a silly name.It belongs to the kind of girl I'm not-a sweet little blue-eyed thing, petted and spoiled by all the family, who romps her way through life without any cares.Wouldn't it be nice to be like that?Whatever faults I may have, no one can ever accuse me of having been spoiled by my family!But it's great fun to pretend I've been.In the future please always address me as Judy.

(Dinner bell. Goodbye.)