Thursday, May 28, 2009

Column: What's in a name? Sometimes not much


My sister and her husband recently welcomed a new baby, a blessed event that was of course preceded by the usual litany of name suggestions from the rest of the family. For instance, my brother suggested “Bubba,” and I wish I could tell you he was kidding.

Naming a baby is always a challenge — I know when my kids (Jacqueline and Timothy) were born, our main goal was to not pick a name that sounded like it was invented in the last 20 minutes. I only say this because of the number of kids named after artificial sweeteners or a type of scarf, a figure that, if the names parents scream at the mall are any indication, I’d put at about 85 percent. (“Splenda! Aspartame! Stop making fun of little Pashmina!” etc.)

Case in point is the annual list of most popular baby names, which came out recently and which confirmed, among other things, that there is nothing that can’t be turned into a name with just a little creativity and a complete disregard for the child’s future mental health.

[Read the rest of this week's AT LARGE by Peter Chianca here.]

1 comment:

Innkeeper Seely said...

The best thing about our court system is that anyone can change their name when they realize that their parents made a huge mistake.