Why “Scout.” One evening at the dinner table I brought up the subject of names for the cart I’d been obsessed with designing and building. My daughter rolled her eyes. My son growled. They were tired of hearing about it. I threw out a few names I’d been mulling over. Rocket? No, they said. Evolve? Nooo. The UUV (Urban Utility Vehicle)? Ugh!!, they groaned. I was getting nowhere.
While washing dishes I asked what they thought about “Scout”. Surprisingly, my husband didn’t scowl. “Like the International Scout?” he asked. (The International Scout was a pioneering American off-road vehicle. Interestingly, the Scout was advertised with women in mind.)
“No. Like the girl in the movie,” my daughter said. You may remember Scout is the narrator of Harper Lee’s book “To Kill a Mockingbird”. Scout is a smart, spunky, tomboy who struggles to find good intentions and kindness in the people of her small, Southern town. Personally, I was thinking about the definition of the word Scout: To explore the unknown. To go out ahead of others.
My son said, “what about boy scout?”
Even that “scout” lent relevant meaning in that our cart provides a “helping hand.” And so it was settled. We would go with Scout.