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I’ve realized that I’ve been defending a lot of names lately and the names I have are surprisingly hard to defend.
My first name, for example — You’d think that it would be pretty hard to argue with. But then the beginning of every semester inevitably rolls around and I spend all week correcting professors that while the registration sheet has me down as Gordon ... Gordon Thurlow Trafton III, they can refer to me simply as Tommy. And I have to explain why every single time as if there is some sort of science to the whole thing. No, Tommy isn’t my middle name, I didn’t make the name up, you can call me Gordon if you want (but no one ever does) and I still don’t know how to write roman numerals in cursive when I signature documents.
Then there is Santa, not the Christmas Saint, but my super-local college rock band. Clearly there are some problems with this, as, in our name, we are assuming ownership of a word that already has extremely strong connotations associated with it. Every out-of-town show we have, I struggle to justify our name as kids ask us why. Of course, a local talent buyer at Canopy wants us to inject an “H” or two in the name to help us out a bit when we’re trying to make a name for ourselves (no pun intended).
It all makes me think that I’m bad at names. Which I am.
But when it comes down to it, does it really matter? It’s amazing that, for just an arbitrary series of characters and a corresponding set of sounds, how desperately we claw and clamber for any sot of meaning in a name. While parents, pet owners business owners and the like name their darlings something marketable, self serving, or sentimental, I’d like to think that the most effective influence on the meaning of a name is the carrier of it.
I mean, my name isn’t real at all. It’s made up and it still works.
Sound Off
Last post: Sep. 3, 2009 at 12:51 pm
Seth (unregistered user) said on Sep. 3, 2009 at 12:51 pm:
Oh Gordy —
I just like the refreshing sound that it makes when you say it with an H....