Rose by Any Other Name

I wrote previously of how Kathy and I assigned each name to our boys after their birth, but I omitted the details of how we selected the names in the first place. It didn't happen the way I would have expected it.

Naming one's child is a serious matter. Every couple gives it a great deal of thought. Baby naming books are consistently strong sellers. A name is the first gift you give your child and in most instances it lasts a lifetime. Who wouldn't agonize over it?

Names are evocative. They remind us of close friends, former classmates, colleagues, movie characters, even people we despise. Many couples decide not to reveal the baby names they are considering, even to close friends and family, because they have learned that any name may provoke a strong reaction, and not always a polite or favorable one.

I once assumed I would choose names fraught with personal meaning, perhaps the name of a great author, or a public figure, or a character from a favorite novel brimming with personal significance. But where does that leave you? With Herman? Theodore? Atticus? One's spouse will surely have an opinion on such choices. And likely as not, she reads different authors and admires different celebrities and actors. Was I willing to risk Fritzwilliam? Pierce? Bra-aad??

(I have a friend who did exactly that, though, naming her son Atticus, and I asked him once after he'd graduated from college how he felt about it. He was pleased with it, I'm happy to say. I now wonder what he'll name his children.)

When I was a perennial bachelor, I suggested absurd options as potential names of future offspring; I claimed facetiously that it was a litmus test for compatible spousal material. "I'd like to name my daughter, Mirth," I might say (and poorly, with my accent). "Or maybe, Blight Louise—it will build character." While others were still shuddering, I'd propose for boy/girl twins the names Vermin and Virus. It was all a big joke designed to get a shocked response and played by a man who never seriously expected to be naming a child. (Although I do still expect Mirth to show up in one of my stories; I may not be as unrestrained as Jonathan Lethem, but the name still charms me.)

The joke on me, of course, is that I did eventually marry, and then had triplets, not twins. My friends were quick to offer suggestions. We repeatedly heard the names, Moe, Larry & Curly, or Huey, Dewey & Louie. One literate friend proposed Athos, Porthos, and Aramis. Baseball companions suggested Matty, Felipe & Jesus, or Tinkers, Evers & Chance. (I liked "Chance.") The triplet naming game was irresistible.

Upon hearing the news that Kathy was pregnant with triplets and that her suggestions for names were welcome, Kathy's five-year-old goddaughter, Molly, went off to think and came back shortly with a 3x5 index card with the names Emily, Kate, and Julia printed carefully in red ink. "That's terrific, Molly," Kathy said, "but what if they are boys?" Molly looked momentarily shocked and betrayed, but returned again later with three more names printed on the card: Justin, Tom, and Scott. We actually liked all three of those and Justin Thomas now owes partial thanks to Molly for his name. I cannot recall as precisely when Andrew and Kevin became candidate names for the other two.

The boys were three years old before I first heard one high school friend of Kathy's explaining to another how cool she thought it was that Kathy had named one of her sons after a high school boyfriend. Can you imagine? It would take real chutzpah to name a child after one's ex. I sometimes wonder how many others still believe this fiction. (Knowing as I do that I had been the one to suggest the name and having heard Kathy's own response to the rumor, I'm not concerned. "But what if you're wrong?" you ask, rudely. Big deal. I admire the man.)

The anticlimactic truth is that we did what many couples do. We sat up at night feeling the babies jockeying for position in the womb and discussed potential names. We made lists of possibilities. We consulted baby naming books. But in the end, we navigated purely by instinct and chose names that just sounded agreeable to both of us.

The middle names were almost easier. We wanted to attach a degree of family legacy to them so we chose unused names that would honor our two oldest brothers, Thomas and Michael; and with some irony, Patrick signified both Kathy's Irish heritage and my Portuguese father who was born on St. Patrick's Day (and may or may not have once had the middle name, Patrick). I paired the middle names with candidates for the first until I was satisfied, and showed them to Kathy. Happily, she concurred.

End of story.

Except...

One can now wonder, How well did we really do? Did we give the boys names that would honor them, that were not absurdly trendy or commonplace? Did we burden them with names better suited for a character in a Jonathan Lethem novel? How will their names sound thirty, fifty, seventy years from now?

The best article I've read on the topic of baby names is called, "Where Have All the Lisas Gone?" by Peggy Orenstein, appearing in The Best American Science and Nature Writing 2004 essay collection.

In trying to select a name that is not going to become the next trendy name, she sets out to determine what really influences the popularity of various baby names. Along the way she discovers the official Popular Baby Names web site hosted by the Social Security Administration. It's a site that "ranks the 1,000 most common boys' and girls' names since 1900. You can also look up a specific name and track its status over time," an activity that Orenstein warns and I echo, "is an Internet addict's sinkhole." Sure enough, I downloaded the data, organized it into a spreadsheet, and began charting and graphing the progress of my siblings' and children's names.

Andrew seems pretty safe: his name has remained in the top 100 boys' names for an entire century, hovering in the top 10 for the last 14 years. He may resent growing up and working alongside so many other Andrews, but he is unlikely to one day find himself burdened with a middle-aged name, like girls named Barbara, Nancy, Karen, Susan, and yes, Peggy. "Those sound like the names of middle-aged women because—guess what?—they are," writes Orenstein.

The name Kevin, on the other hand, surprised me. It didn't even make an appearance in the top 1,000 male names until it placed 830 in the 1920's. How is that possible? In the 1900's Rudolph ranked 129th. There was also Hyman (265), Barney (269), Solomon and Moses in the top 300, Aloysius for goddsakes (no offense) at 381, Hoyt (595) and Casper (608), but the name Kevin couldn't even break into the top 1,000? Fortunately, it took off like a bullet once it made the chart, and has remained in the top 30 or so for nearly 50 years. Kevin, also, should age without fear of becoming the Chauncey of his generation.

Then there is Justin. My poor little guy has not one, not two, but three "Justin H's" as classmates. No wonder the name already shows evidence of having peaked at 9. Worse yet, it only really began to rise in popularity in the 70's. Thanks a lot, Molly (102). If he weren't such a funning pool ("Hey, I'm Justin Time!"), I'd fear he might one day begrudge us his trendy name, as one day he still might.

Luckily for me, my naming days are over—blessedly before I found the SSA's Popular Baby Name web sinkhole. But for those of you still naming babies, whether you're considering Roses (358), Moses (503) or Beauses (423); Dylans (19) or Villains (as if); Destiny (37) or Chance (246), you'll get thoroughly dazed and confused on this site.

Good luck.