Wednesday, August 8, 2007

I am a superstar, 4 real

According to my Yahoo homepage today, the little baby in Australia can't be named 4real, so the parents are going to officially name him Superman but call him 4real. Which reminded me of an episode of The View I saw once which reminded me of the fact that I am totally a celebrity undiscovered. I'll try and get ya there - One day a long time ago the ladies were talking about celebrities naming their children ridiculous - I mean, really beautiful and special - names. Joy Behar said they were celebrities in the first place because they were narcissistic and craved attention, so it would follow that they would try and give their children that same edge by having strange names. I totally agree. And the reason I agree is because I am one of them, just not so much. I have a unique name too, Serenity. And oh my goodness I love the fact that people remember you from second grade or from that day they met you at the park when you were eight. I asked a question of a famous author in one of those kid literary day classes (what are they called?) and he mentioned me in the next class. I know this because the acquaintances in that next class knew he must have been talking about me and told me later. I can pretty much count on a comment whenever I introduce myself. And here's the thing, I enjoy this. And if I could pass it on to my own children . . .well, it's too late for that. Because I married a man who I think has the most wonderful name on the planet, but so did the majority of America for about 20 years running, and he too prefers the solid, manly names. He might have let me go unique for a girl, but our boys are going to know right where they stand in the naming polls for several decades and when they stand in front of a key chain display, their name will definitely be there. So anyway, I kinda sympathize with the Australian couple except, well, it's not so cool that they used their newborn to get their own 15 minutes of fame is it? A unique name is one thing, then the focus stays on the person. But a name that gets the government involved because it simply isn't legal? For the rest of his life, rather than, "that's a cool name", that kid is definitely going to get questions about his parents. That may be taking our narcissism one generation too far.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

For a long time I hated my name--Pamela. My twin sister got the unique name--Tamela. But I found that my name means "melody" and though I would much prefer the name Melody I find that the meaning of my name actually fits my personality. I love music and I'm a sort of sing-songy kind of person. My mother knew what she was doing after all!