19 January 2007 15:15

Making a name for herself.

past perfect | future perfect then | now peek | scrawl compose | notes booklog stuff to ponder

Right. So, one of the things that your humble correspondent does now that she is gainfully unemployed is to ponder the state of the universe. And folks, it is not promising. That's all I have to report on the generic universe thing. On a more specific and touchy topic: not to open a gigantic kettle of fishy worms (or wormy fish), but perhaps my married peeps* can tell me why it is that, when the subject of wedlock raises its beringed head, all of a sudden women's names are not their own any more. And I'm not talking about just the question of to change or not to change; I'm talking prior to even that, when women start to debate things like "will I take my husband's name, or keep my father's name?" For the record, let's get one thing very clear: my father's name is Mark. Mine is not. We share a last name, but the rest of it is all mine, baby. I may not have picked it myself, but I've had one name for the entire 3+ decades of my existence, and it is M-I-N-E mine, not dad's or grandpa's or anyone else's (I'm pretty sure no one has the same Irish firstname - French middle name - Scandinavian last name combo that I have, either). And, furthermore, why does my partner/future husband get to have his own name and not HIS father's name? I could see it if the question was "Do I keep my dad's name or take his dad's?" But that isn't the question. It's my dad's, or my husband's. They get to have names, and somehow, mine doesn't exist. And frankly, I find the formulation of that question nausea-provoking. Change your name or don't. But don't minimize the name you forged your identity with by distancing yourself from it and making it someone else's, or saying it's weird or funny-sounding (why don't parents ever give their sons weird or funny-sounding last names, either?). I think it's probably that we, as women, are taught to think of our names as temporary, or less important, or not important at all. Think of all the girls in junior high who wrote all of the possible permutations of their name combined with their crushes' names on their book covers. I think there's something deeply problematic about it. That being said, the last three letters of my partner in crime's last name are the same as the first three letters of mine, so we've jokingly discussed combining them into one, computer-befuddling, 14 lettered compound surname if we ever wed. This (the wedding, not the name catastrophe, or perhaps neither one) are unlikely to happen, but I'll spread out the unorthodox views on all things partnership and family, and discuss my devotion to the destruction of marriage in some other post. Probably after several dozen more posts on things like tea and cats and the Vietnam war. Stay tuned. love, might * Dear married peeps: you know I love you whatever your name happens to be, and I don't expect you to make your life decisions based on my world philosophy, and I don't think less of you for doing whatever it is that makes your life shinier. Neither one of us needs to be affirmed in our beliefs by having everyone in the universe feel and act the same way, right? I add this caveat because I've made people feel defensive with my positions before, and it isn't my intention at all. I simply find that, having a position that's pretty far out of the mainstream, it helps people to understand if I articulate it to the best of my ability, which involves discussion of what my issues with mainstream choices are. My issues aren't with you, and I'd be hurt if you thought that they were. And if, after this, you still feel defensive, drop me a line and we can talk about it - and you probably won't want to read whatever I decide I have to say about marriage, either.