What's in a name?

So everyone is asking me about what baby names we have picked -- and honestly, we have 6 months -- we haven't even gotten our brains there yet.  We had always discussed that we wanted a "normal" name but nothing too common (i.e. something between a Sarah and Apple) but that was about it.  But this has gotten me thinking about the whole last name situation . . . .

I never took Brad's last name when we got married.  At the time it seemed like I was giving up my identity.  I have a large family and we are very close (although in fairness I am not especially close with my Father, whose last name I inherited) But still it was part of my identity.  Brad comes from a small family and while their is more history to his last name, they are not a particularly close knit clan.  Besides all of the traditional feminist reasons of being an independent woman and not wanting to be my husband's property, I just couldn't see myself giving up my identity and my family name to be replaced with a moniker that wasn't particularly important to those people who already had it.  I didn't want to abandon my siblings either -- although now my Sister has gone and married and taken her husband's name -- as has my Mother.  So the women in the family all have different last names now. 

And now that I am preggo, in addition to thinking about the kid's first name, I find myself pondering the kid's last name.  I assume it will be Brad's last name, but I think it will bother me a bit to not have the child be identified in part as my own too.  So then, do I change my name?  I could go the route of hyphenating the kid's name, but then what happens if they want to marry someone with a hyphenated last name?  We seem to be setting our kids up for a law firm like merger where names become items to barter and pawns of the acquisition.  Plus, we are fairly certain if we have a boy baby, he will be named after Brad's Grandfather "John Allen" and have a double first name and then a double last name would be too much!

Perhaps it is all in my head, but the gravity of this decision is weighing on me.  A lot of my identity has come from my name, and any decision to alter my identity, or more significantly, shaping a new child's identity, I feel cannot be taken lightly.  But, as usual, my propensity to negotiate has me talking myself into and out of corners right, left and center . . . So round and round I go.  Like a Merry-Go-Round.  Where I will stop, nobody knows!

I suppose I should get back to work though
Namaste,
~Clare

Secret Club

So I have started to tell more and more people about my little pregnancy "secret" which has come with its own onslaught of emotions.  It has been really interesting to watch the different reactions from those I've told.  Of course, everyone is happy for me -- I think there's a law on the books somewhere that says you have to be -- but it has been an unexpected opportunity for people to share their stories.  There have been a lot of "when I was pregnant . . ." or "when my wife was pregnant".  And I am struck by how much people want to share.  It's not even that they want to share so much detail as much as they want to share in the rite of pregnancy and all of the rituals that go with it.  Like it's this joint adventure that people who come to this point in their lives get to go on together.

Very much like a club.  There are lots of secrets and tips and tricks and insider information that come with being a member of this club.  I wasn't entitled to any of this information before -- heck, I didn't even know there was a club or any of this information to be had.  Which is weird, right?  There was this whole facet of people's lives that I was totally in the dark about.  People I am close to and who don't keep secrets from me; and yet there was this big gaping hole in how I knew them and was able to connect with them.  On the one hand this is uncomfortable and a bit unsettling, and on the other hand I feel very embraced and secretly supported by this whole cadre of people who have gone before me. 

I feel like I have ascended the ranks now somehow, into this upper echelon of "cool kids" whose secret club is made all the more "cool" by simple virtue of its exclusivity.  Which is dumb.  Because MTV has stayed on the air for upwards of a decade by making shows about kids having kids, and any idiot who has survived puberty can make a baby.  So the club isn't really that hard to get into.  But the club of parenthood is privileged, and I am getting the sense that I don't even begin to appreciate the magnitude of that privilege yet. 






So I am thinking about the enormity of this privilege, and the funny camaraderie that is generated amongst members of this club, and how entirely odd the whole thought of a life growing inside of me is. . .

Namaste,
~Clare

Big News!

So I know I have been radio silent for a while . . . aren't I always apologizing for this . . . and I don't really have any good excuses, so I'm not going to try.  But I have big news now, and I am hopeful that this news and the new phase in my life is going to catapult me back into blogging (because I really do miss it at times!)

I'm pregnant!!

It feels weird to say out loud.  Like somehow just the act of declaring it to the open universe - even if there is no one listening - makes it more real . . . so more to come later.  But I need to embrace this next chapter with gusto and I am hopeful that blogging again is going to help with that.

Namaste,
~Clare