Dear Abby has had an interesting couple of days. A while back she urged a stepmother to talk with her stepdaughter about her choice to spell the name "Gisella" with four Ms and a silent Q. Yesterday's follow-up column included those readers who thought Abby was clearly trying to squelch the beautiful creativity of the naming process, while those today had some common sense.
I guess it's not hard to figure out on which side of the naming controversy I fall.
It's not that I don't remember the nearly irrepressible urge to name my potential baby daughter Allyssyn or Tiphani. Oh, I clearly do. It's just that I wanted to do that when I was 12, and then I got over it. Also, having named my own child Connery, I can't really fault anyone for going with an unusual name, but spelling the #1 on the Social Security name list with extra letters or weird combinations isn't fooling anyone. Dzakob is still going to be Jacob, just with anger management issues.
And can we talk about -ayden/-aiden/-aden, please? I've got no beef with Aiden as a name. In fact, my beautiful goddaughter's middle name is Aiden. I think it's a great name for a boy or a girl. But, as a nation, we're going a little crazy with the -aden names. It started out innocently enough, with names like Jaden, Braeden, Caden. Nothing wrong there. Now, however, we're entering a long national nightmare where virtually any consonant or consonant cluster can be tacked onto -aden and called a name. How long until Slayden? Daiden? Gayden? I can virtually guarantee that there is some mother out there right now contemplating just that. (In fact, you might be able to find her here. Do not, I repeat, DO NOT read the site while drinking any kind of beverage, unless you enjoy cleaning it off your screen and keyboard following your spit take.) And there is nothing we can do to stop her.
If she were Czech or French or any number of other European nationalities, we would still have a prayer. Many European countries have what can only be called the Name Police, designed to protect innocent babies from becoming Pilot Inspektors or Reignbeaus. (Indeed, had Chip or I been Czech, we might have had a bit of a problem with the Czech Name Police for Connery--though we did have proof in a book that it existed as a first name--but as Americans, they didn't bug us. They know that America is the land of the Moon Unit, after all.)
Still, I'm quite sure that a naming bureaucracy would not garner support from most Americans. (Sadly, it might have more support from the masses than another European import, national health care, but that's another topic entirely.) We want to have the Constitutionally protected right to exert our own individuality through our kids. We can never go back to our own pre-babyhood and stop our parents from naming us Jason when there were already 27 Jasons in the schools we were to attend, but we can damn sure prevent little Wolfgang from suffering the same fate.
Or should that be Wulphgangg?
Every child is unique, whether she is called Emily or Tu Morrow. Why make life harder by saddling a child with the kind of name that demands constant repetition, correction, or stifled laughter? Adolescence will be hard enough without trying to live down Jermajesty or Romeo. Abby, you've still got my vote.