Allow me to explain.
My two older sisters spent hours upon hours looking up names for their babies, Shelley especially. I scoffed, thinking, "what's the big deal? There are plenty of amazing names out there, just grab one up!" But alas, it is not so simple. According to my sisters, (and evidently moms in general) the baby's name cannot be that of any other baby born within the last decade. The baby's name should have some form of tie to an ancestor or relative, or some trendy spin on their names, so you don't actually name your child "Bertha", "Horace", or "Glenda". The baby's name shall not under any circumstance be allowed to transform into an undesirable nickname. The name can't have too many syllables when paired with the middle name.
As I heard the ghastly amount of thought you have to put in to naming your children, I began to understand and respect Dr. Seuss for naming some of his creations "Thing 1" and "Thing 2".
I suppose I put some thought into names myself. I'm fond of the name "Amaya", which means "night rain" in Japanese and "high place" in Spanish. What's not to love? Well, evidently when you say it with a last name, it sounds like an identity crisis. "Amaya Graber" becomes "Am I a Graber?" I don't know if I could put up with that nonsense.
Have you ever looked up your own name? I'm sure at one point or another you've heard or read about the meaning of your name. My parents, being God-fearing, sensible human beings, gave me the name Shawn. In Hebrew, it means "God is gracious, merciful, Jehovah is gracious, God's gracious gift". That's just dandy with me, and I quite like my own name. Much better than getting named "Espen" (a trendy play on the abbreviation ESPN) or "Apple". Not that I have anything against apples.
But as I dug deeper into the variations and meanings of the name "Shawn", I found that Hebrew doesn't have the corner on the definition market. HouseofNames.com gives me this charming little tidbit: "In addition to being a variant of John, Zan is also from the Italian, meaning "a clown"."
Shawn: Thanks for that, Italy.
Italy: You think that's bad, Clownboy? Just you keep on reading.
Ignoring the evil chuckle coming from a country that looks like a woman's high-heeled boot, I went deeper into the meaning of my name and learned far more than I ever wanted to know. I wandered across the gender line and started to read about the female Shawns out there. Does a girl's "Shawn" mean the same as mine? IT DOES NOT. "From the Hebrew, meaning "pretty, beautiful", as it is a variant form of Shaina. Also from the Hindu, meaning "chickpea". Shawn is from the Irish, meaning "God's gracious gift"."
Israel: See? Perfectly acceptable name.
Ireland: Why, nothin' but a bonny blue lass!
Tibet: Tee hee! I like chickpeas!
Believe it or not, it's pretty difficult to find a name with a negative meaning. "Ichabod" is the only one that comes to mind. Even "Delilah" has a nice meaning: "gentle". "Delilah" also means "hair", so you can take that either way.
Now that we have the meaning of Shawn squared away, we arrive at SPELLING, which also happens to be a big deal in the name world. You've chosen your child's name because of all the nice meanings behind it, but now you have all the variations to contend with. Here are the synonyms for the name "Shawn", separated by country. (Also, since I find that lists are boring, I've put it into a conversation format.)
Ireland: Hey everybody! I made up a new name! It's "Shawn".
England: Hmm, needs improvement. "John". No, wait, "Jon"! Both are nice.
Greece: Ugh, too formal. "Joannes" is waaaaayyyy trendier.
Israel: "Hanok"! "Yochanan"!
France: I haven't screwed up enough English words yet. So, "Jean", perhaps?
Russia: "IVAN". (Seriously, how did they get "Ivan" from "Shawn" (or the other way around)? Russia has some serious questions to answer.)
Germany: "Haines" sounds goot, yah. He'll get teased about his undies. Tee hee! Und those Grecians have it wrong, yah. It should be spelled "Johann".
Denmark: Too many letters! Make it "Hans".
Italy: "Giovanni" positively SPRINGS from the tongue, no?
Spain: No, no, it doesn't sound like a name involved with the Black Market. How about, "Juan"?
Wales: We're going for Shortest Name Award, so "Jan".
Ireland: Everybody is the whole world is crazy.
Those were just the BOY variations. The girl ones include Channa, Shakila, Shakilla,Sephorra, Sephora, Channa, and Shanara.
What got me all started on this knowledge quest was the discovery of a plaque in my dad's garage with the Graber Coat of Arms on it. A family crest! I immediately felt a glow of pride in my heritage. Our family crest is beastly. Just look at it!
Here it is on a commemorative beer stein.
But I found it on a wooden plaque, not a beer stein.
And NO, I don't see any resemblance between the Graber family crest and the universal signal for DANGER or CAUTION.
What would possibly make you think they looked alike? Posh with a capital P!
HouseOfNames jumps in with another helpful little fact. "The distinguished German surname Graber is derived from the Old High German "graban," meaning "to dig." The name was originally used to indicate "a digger of graves or ditches."
I wouldn't have placed "grave digger" under "distinguished positions and occupations", but who am I to argue with the Germans? Perhaps they honored the people that did jobs nobody else wanted to do. Kinda like we do with plumbers nowadays, but instead of honor we give them money.
As many of you know, (for it is one of my favorite stories to tell) I was going to receive the name "Shane" up until it was stolen 14 days before I was born. The name-thieves were none other than my roommate Shane's parents.
Debby: "What do we name our son? Sam and Serena took our name!"
Barry: "Let's name him Shane anyway. We don't hang out with them very much."
Debby: "We see them far too often. We can't have our sons named the same."
(Note: I was not living at the time this conversation took place, so I can't claim complete accuracy in the quotations.)
So I was named Shawn instead. Shane Schwartz, my roommate, is a very close friend of mine and I'm glad my mom was sensible and named me something different, although Shane contends that it would be "practically the coolest thing" if we were able to call ourselves Shane & Shane.
My parents had their revenge 6 years later, when my brother Shane was born. It was like, "See what we did? We got to have a son name Shane anyway."
Two possible responses my parents had when naming my brother Shane.
I'm not even slightly ashamed to say that I like the name Shawn better than Shane. Perhaps it was because I didn't know there was a possibility I was going to be named Shane until I was a teenager and had gotten used to being Shawn. So by the time my parents mentioned that my name was changed a scant two weeks before I was born, I couldn't possibly imagine being called anything different.
HouseOfNames backs me up on this point, and states that "Psychologists find that if people are happy with their names, they are generally happy with themselves." That smarmy little quote was found under the name "Delilah", as if to say "Cheer up! Getting named Delilah isn't the end of the world."
And it isn't. I know of a Delilah that is so awesome, she's every bit as positive as Sampson's treacherous barber-wife was negative.
Thank you, Mom and Dad, for my name. I love it. My outburst at the beginning of this blog was not in anger or a feeling of injustice. I was shouting only because I'm amazed that out of all the thousands and thousands of choices, you picked the perfect name for me.
Of course, with knowledge comes change. Thanks to the internet, when I greet a stranger, I'll say "Hello! I'm Chickpea, the Grave-Digging Clown."
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