Rubella, We Got You A Middle Name

As a sixteen year old girl, I found the best way to scare the living crap out of your mother is to hijack her book of baby names and claim them as your own.

Looking back, it probably didn't send off the best signals. But I was thirteen when my little brother was born and I would spend the rest of my middle and high school years writing stories. Novels, short fiction, blurbs, whatever you want to call them. And when you spend your free time wrapping yourself into your own little fantasy world where you call the shots and every character is yours, baby name books are like a treasure chest.

It was mere innocence. I was using them for research. For reference. For finding the perfect combination of names to fit my brooding heroine or handsome and romantic hero. I'm sure for years my mother suspected otherwise because while she knew I was writing, I never let her touch my stories.

Because of my stories, I've always been fascinated with names and how just the right or wrong one can screw up the character and completely change the course of your story.

I wish mothers would realize that the same applies to your children. I know that in a medieval fantasy, odd names might work. I know that a modern character might not be taken as seriously if her name were Osthryth or Alefreda, because seriously, why would anyone in their right mind want a name reminiscent of a pasta sauce?

Naming your kids can be tricky. There are so many factors to consider. I used to think a lot about what I'd name my kids. It was only natural because I spent a lot of time naming my characters and I understood the significance of names. How they can fit personalities and reflect peoples characters. And incite teasing or define individuality. Or not.

Even to this day, I wouldn't want my kids to be a first name, initial kid. You know, like Sarah S. or Sarah M. Because there are five or six other Sarah's in their class. But to be honest, considering the trendy names of kids today, I could probably get away with naming my daughter Sarah and her being the only one among six or seven Madison's or Isabelle's or Olivia's.

It's odd how the names I like high school became so popular. I loved Aidan for a boy, but it seems there are so many of them out there. I liked Madison for a girl. And Isabella. We all know how those turned out. For awhile, I loved Antonia Rose. I fell in love with that name after watching Practical Magic (Sally's daughter was named Antonia) and to this day, haven't run into many Antonias. But at the same time, Antonia never really flowed with the last names of boyfriends that I'd pair with it (because every girl can fantasize, right?).

I even went through a period of time where I hated all normal spellings. I spelled names with Y's instead of I's or E's. My name was Krysty or Krystynn, instead of Kristy or Kristen. Or K's instead of C's. Rebekah, Jessika, Nikole. I see so much of that now. Those poor children will never know how to write an I or an E because their names are Cyndee Mackynzi Nykole.

My own name never particularly fascinated me. It always conjured up images of ditzy cheerleaders and such. Plus, some of the nicknames were never that nice. Aside from it all, no one could ever spell or pronounce it right. I can't tell you how many times in my life I got Christy, Kristi, Kristie, Christie, Chrissy, Christine, Christen, or Krissy. I got to the point where unless it mattered, I didn't correct people. It was rather exhausting.

For the longest time, my mother told me I was supposed to be Jennifer Dawn or Kristen Dawn, but at the last minute, they decided to name me after my father, Lynn (his real name is Ronald Lynn, but he's been known as Lynn his whole life). I felt that made me special. It gave me a special connection to him, to someone I looked up and admired. It kind of sucked when he married his second wife, named Krystal Lynn (both for personal and legal reasons because our names were so close and we were so close in age - eight years, yea, Dad robbed the cradle) and they had two little girls whom they worked Lynn into their names - Alexandria Lynn and Tresalynn Marie. And then they got divorced and she remarried and had another daughter named Maylynnda Marie (weird much?). So the novelty of that name wore thin for me and I don't think I could go anywhere near it if I had to.

When my little brother was born, I suggested we name him Nicholas Ryan or Nicholas Ashton, because it was a character I had been working on for awhile and I really loved the name. I thought Nicholas was elegant and regal and strong. My mother and father agreed, up until my mom mentioned that we would call him Nicky when he was young and then shorten it to Nick or call him Nicholas (I always preferred the full version). My father nixed that idea because Nicky sounded too girly to him. Therefore, we went with Tyler Ashton because Tyler was their second choice. Ashton was long before that punk got popular and was in no reference to him. It was actually my parents male version of Ashley, in honor of where they met and fell in love, West Ashley.

I don't know if Steve and I will ever have kids. And just as a side note to all the family members reading this, I am not pregnant. I don't plan on being pregnant anytime soon. This isn't leading to anything, it's just me rambling about stupid crap while watching horrible TV and being terribly bored. Reagardless, while I don't know if we ever will have kids, we've been together long enough for me to not consider anyone else if it ever does happen, so when thinking about stupid shit like this, it's only natural to add his last name to my combinations.

I'm currently fixated on having the middle names of my children (one boy and one girl, naturally) be Cooper and Ashley, after the two main rivers that converge around the peninsula of Charleston. Cheesy, I know, but I'm attached to them because we both started a brand new life here and I thought it would be meaningful. I love Addison for a girl and I'm still in love with Aidan. So it would be Addison Ashley and Aidan Cooper. How much more pretentious could I be? *barfs* :-)

I also fell in love with Saoirse, which is a Gaelic name meaning "freedom" and is pronounced Seer-sha. I thought it was gorgeous the first time I heard it but seriously, I had to look up the spelling. How the hell do you think a five-year-old is going to be able to spell it? I've seen many people spell it phonetically, like Seersha or Searsha, which works but I can still see teachers butchering it. And at the same time, I think that choosing a name like that and then spelling it phoenetically instead of the way it's supposed to be spelled sort of takes away from the significance and meaning of it all.

Another one I heard from a friend was Reverly. I thought I had misheard her at first until she nodded and smiled and said it was like Beverly, only with an R. I said I had never heard it before and that it was pretty and unique. She said her friend had named her daughter that and it was a good Southern name. Regardless of what it is, I thought it was pretty but my commitment to it is still up in the air.

If there is anyone after my own heart about the confusion of names, talk to Tara. Her named is pronounced TAH-rah, not TARE-ah or Terra. She has a rant about on her page. She is serious, ya'll, but I'm sure she'll sympathiz with me on this. :-)

The funniest name issue I have is that if Steve and I ever get married, my new name will be the same. As in, his last name is pronounced the same as my first. Out of respect for privacy, I'm not going to go into major detail but let's just say that being something similar to Lucy Lucy or Gail Gale is not very appealing, both personally and professionally. Steve finds it hysterical and says that's one of the conditions for getting married. All fun and games for him because he's not the one who can shorten his married to one word or to [name]-squared. But I'll take it in stride. I just find it pretty funny that I ended up in that situation.

So that's my long boring rant and rumination on baby names. It's something that's always fascinated me and while I'm no where near having to be really concerned about it, it's enough to fill up a blog entry and inspire people to think. So what do you think?

I'll be sure to check back to this entry for reference if I ever do have children. Maybe I'll still have my little yuppies, Addison Ashley and Aiden Cooper. Maybe they'll be weird names like Rainflower and Sunshine and Leaf. Maybe I'll go traditional like Sarah or Rebecca or Joseph or Luke. (God knows, THOSE would be the most individual names in school by the time my kids grow up)

Or maybe I'll just go with Brandine and Cletus. They have a nice lovely ring to them.