The Name Game

From the time I was old enough to understand that when a woman marries a man she then takes his name as her own (age six), I’ve been pairing my name with a long and colorful history of surnames. This always depended, of course, on whom I happened to be crushing on at the time. In first grade it was Brian Van Horn.

Carrie Van Horn

In 3rd grade it was Adam Yatooma. Carrie Yatooma. (Sounded like “Carry a tumor.” Ick.) Later it would be Carrie Green, Carrie Frederick, Carrie Frank, Carrie Mansfield, Carrie Hanton. These imagined ‘new names’ would fill the pages of my spiral notebooks, my private diary, my secret heart. I would say the name aloud in various ways (in private!) and giggle at the sheer possibility of it. Although I could see every romantic detail of the wedding: the dress, the cake (of course), the shoes, the flowers, the bridesmaids and the bouquet toss, the most important and romantic part of getting married (in my adolescent mind) was the name change. The idea that a man could love you so much that he offers you his name…well it’s terrifically romantic, isn’t it?

But as I grew older, I grew more superstitious of this ‘name game’ of mine. Considering my track record (none of my adult relationships lasted longer than 2 months), I vowed I would neither scribble nor doodle my first name with anyone’s last name until such time as I had an engagement ring on my left hand or some other tangible and obvious sign that a marriage was eminent.

And so I plowed ahead…meeting men and dating men and not thinking a bit about their last name – or at least trying not to. But I noticed something. As I watched my girlfriends and female family members marry, a new and alarming trend seemed to emerge: most of these women weren’t taking their husbands’ names. Whaaat? How could this be? Surely these women had day dreamed and played ‘the name game’ as I had. What happened?

Some cited ‘professional reasons’. Others had lived with their name so long that to change it seemed, well, a betrayal to who they were. Some chose to compromise by hyphenating their last name (a’la Meredith Baxter-Berney – well, Meredith Baxter now…hrm… bad example). One former coworker combined her last name with her husband’s and both took on that name, and another pair of friends decided they would both completely abandon their last names and adopt a new name entirely, taking inspiration from their favorite jazz musician, Miles Davis.

That’s all fine and good and to each his own and blah, blah, blah. But that is neither fine nor good for me. And I was happy and pleased to hear my husband say (when I brought up the subject of changing my name) “I love you and I support whatever you would like to do…but I would be lying if I said I wouldn’t be a tiny bit disappointed if you didn’t want to take my name. I have waited my whole life to share everything with someone…including my last name.”

(Hrm. I now wonder if my husband has spiral notebooks and journals from his adolescent years covered with the first names of a variety of girls paired with his own last name. I’ll have to ask him later…but I’m willing to bet that he does! And that only makes me love him more.)

So. Fast forward a bit. We get engaged, we go through the exhausting, exhilarating, stressful and ridiculous ordeal of planning the wedding. We get married. And in a matter of weeks, * poof * I have completely changed my name.

I have thought long and hard about the meaning and symbolism and the reason for changing my name. Yes, I love my maiden name. But I love what taking on this new name means. It is truly important to me. We are now a team. A united front. There is no confusion for the mailman or relatives – Duncan’s daycare place or our future child’s teachers. He is the Mr. and I am the Mrs. Changing my name to his does not mean that I now hide in his shadow or somehow bury the woman I was before him. It is a gesture of commitment – and though many may see it as old fashioned and out-dated, it has only ever seemed natural and right to me.

And so I say my ‘new name’ aloud and proud (and often). And though it may not bring on the same giggles as when I was a girl, I do feel a profound feeling of gladness and gratitude at the reality of it. Recently, I called to make an appointment with a new stylist to get a much-needed haircut. After spelling my full name and repeating it for her, she remarked, “Wow. What a lovely name.” I nearly gushed in my giddiness, “Thank you! It’s new! I just got married.” (Ok, so maybe the name change does make me feel like it did when I played the name game as a girl…so sue me!)

But then the oddest thing happened. Though saying my new name was as easy and natural as breathing, I realized with alarm – I didn’t know how to sign my new name. Suddenly I felt like I was learning to write with a pen for the first time - with my left hand. I found myself accidentally signing my maiden name, or worse – once, while signing for some groceries, I misspelled my new name. Luckily it was so garbled looking anyway, that only I knew, but still. How embarrassing!

Now I'm thinking that perhaps I should not have been so hasty to abandon my habit of scrawling all those imagined ‘new names’ on the pages of notebooks. If I hadn’t, perhaps I’d be a bit better at writing my married name now.

Well, thankfully I have a lifetime to practice it.