Monkey June Stories

Story One

Once upon a time there was a girl named Monkey June. Her real name wasn’t ‘Monkey’ of course; that was a nickname that she had been given. Her real name was June. Well, not really. Her actual first name was Juniper. But almost no one called her that. Except her mom when she was in trouble, I guess.

I can tell you’re already wondering how she got the nickname ‘Monkey June’. Was she mischievous? Extremely active? A good climber? Was she furry? Did she love bananas? Could she pick up random objects with her feet? Did she have large brown eyes?

Some of those things might have been true, and some of them definitely were not, but one reason she had the name Monkey June should not be at all surprising: Monkey June liked monkeys.

Now, when I used the word ‘like’ just then, I probably didn’t paint an accurate picture of how much Monkey June liked monkeys. She LOVED monkeys. Not just monkeys, though. She was a fan of all primates. Lemurs, bush babies, baboons, macaques, mandrills, proboscis monkeys, gibbons, orangutans, gorillas, chimpanzees, bonobos, howler monkeys, spider monkeys, capuchins, squirrel monkeys, and I could go on and on with this, but I think you’re starting to get the picture already.

She knew that the world’s smallest monkey is the pygmy marmoset, and she knew that the world’s largest monkey is the Eastern Gorilla. You might say that she was more of a monkey expert than most monkey experts—and if you said that, I would say that you were probably right.

Her room was decorated with monkeys of all kinds. She had monkey sheets on her bed, monkey curtains on her windows, monkey pillows all over the place, and a monkey vine hanging from her bedroom ceiling. (If you don’t know what a monkey vine is, I’m not going to tell you, because then you’ll want one, and you’ll pester some poor grown-up until you get one, and then you’ll climb on it, and then you’ll fall from it and hurt yourself, and I don’t want to be even partially responsible for any of that.)

Even with all of these monkey things in her life, though, no one called her Monkey June—not yet. Right now is when you’ll hear the story of how that happened…

June went to school one day. (You’ll notice that I called her ‘June’ just then.) Before you ask what kind of school she went to, I’ll let you know that she was a girl about your age and she went to a school quite similar to yours—unless you’re homeschooled, in which case you’ll have to imagine her school as a typical public school, not at all like your school, because your school is probably in your kitchen or your living room. Enough about you, though. Let’s get back to June.

June was having an ordinary school day until some new kid at school came right up to her at recess and got right in her face and asked her (quite rudely), “What’s with all the monkey stuff?”

June didn’t know this boy, but she figured he was probably just new at school and had never met her before, so she decided to respond nicely to him.

“I like monkeys,” she said with a smile. “Everyone has something they like. What’s your something?”

“I don’t like anything,” the boy said, quite rudely. “And I think it’s silly to like monkeys. You have monkey stickers on everything. Your backpack is a monkey backpack. Your lunch bag looks like a monkey. It’s weird. What’s your name, anyway?”

“I’m June,” June said. “Nice to meet you. What’s your name?”

“I’m Phil,” he said with a bit of a sneer, “but I’m not the one with a monkey obsession. I think we should call you ‘Monkey June’. That should be your new name! You like monkeys so much; you should probably have one in your name. What do you think of that?”

The boy was clearly trying to upset her, but June knew that being mean to mean people only made them meaner. In fact, she had learned that there are some kids in this world who just like to go around being mean to other kids so they can see how upset they can make them—and she also knew that if you don’t let them get you upset, they usually lose interest and leave you alone.

June suddenly remembered one of her favorite Bible verses: Romans 12:18 - ‘If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.’ ‘All’ means everybody—even the mean ones. June decided to use her wits to turn this ugly situation around. As far as it depended on her, she was going to live peaceably with Phil, whether he liked it or not. 

She smiled at Phil and said as nicely as possible, “What do I think of that? I think it’s the best idea I’ve ever heard! In fact, I’m surprised I didn’t think of it myself a long time ago! I do love monkeys, and they are basically in every part of my life. I have monkey curtains in my room, a monkey blanket, monkey pillows, monkey slippers… But I never thought about building my love of monkeys right into my name! I love it!"

Phil looked at her with the most confused look that she had ever seen. He seemed to be speechless. June went on, raising her voice so everyone around them on the playground could hear her.

“So from this day forward I shall be known as ‘Monkey June’! And I thank Phil here for helping me think of it. Is there anything I can do for you, Phil? Do you need a cool nickname? You seem like a pretty chill guy; maybe I could call you ‘Chill Phil’? If that’s not good, I can think about it and come up with something better."

“I don’t know,” Phil said. “No one’s ever come up with a nickname for me before.”

“Well, I’ll call you Chill Phil until you tell me otherwise. There’s the bell. Time for us to go back in. Welcome to the school, by the way.”

With that, Monkey June (for that was her name now) ran to catch up with her friends as they lined up to go back into the school. As they walked back to class, her friends asked her about the new kid and what they had been talking about. Monkey June told them all about it.

“So you thought of a Bible verse and it reminded you to be nice to people,” her friend Carolyn asked, “—even people who are being mean to you? And it worked?”

“Yup,” Monkey June said. “I need to remember to do that more often.”

“And what was the verse again?” Marilyn asked.

“Romans 12:18 - ‘If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.’ And ‘all’ means everybody—even the mean ones. That last part’s not in the Bible. That’s just me telling you what ‘all’ means.”

Believe it or not, from that day on, Chill Phil was a friend of Monkey June’s. She learned later that he had been having a very grumpy day—he was new at their school and didn’t know anyone—and he thought that maybe the best way to start out strong at a new school was to pick on some smaller kids. Of course, he learned something that day that we already know: that’s not a good way to start out at a new school at all.

Luckily, everything worked out well for everyone. Monkey June had a new name that she loved, and Phil had a new friend.

And now you know how Monkey June got her name!

I’m sure you aren’t at all curious about any of Monkey June’s other adventures, so you can probably stop reading (or listening) now. But if you are curious to learn more about her, I suppose you could continue reading (or listening). There are plenty of other stories here about her.

Or maybe you should get a good night’s sleep and read (or listen) some more tomorrow.