Naming

What's in a name? We are given them when we are born, and they follow us through the rest of our lives. For women - they sometimes change with marriage, but that first name - it sticks. I've never really been too fond of my first name - it doesn't turn into a cool nickname, and it's always seemed so BLAND. So - me being me - I've come up with a couple of other names I use rather often.

Jasmyn is my online name and I've used for so long it feels like it's really my name. It's gotten bad enough that if someone yells out "Jasmyn!" in a store - my head will pop up. If scraggly looking men ask me what my name is - it's always Jasmyn. Jasmyn is my alterego - the chick that I really WANT to be - and luckily she's not that different from the chick I am. She's a little bolder, and little more flexible, a little more open...but in the main, she's me.

Then there's A'ishah - my middle name. I've ALWAYS loved my middle name, and when I was younger I was quite fascinated by the 'original' A'ishah - the Prophet Muhammad's favorite and youngest wife. She reminded me of me a little - young, brash, a little rebellious, usually causing trouble - a classic teenager, really. As I got older - and that DAMN ABC song came out - I've tended to shy away from using it - but for some reason when I started this diary, I wanted to use a name that was really mine.

Then there's my current last name. I was born with the last name McFarland - my mother was actually traditional enough to give me the sperm donors last name. I was two when she changed both of our last names to our current one - which is intensely and totally Arabic. Mind you - I LOOK like an African American, not an African or Arabian person, nor do I have an accent - yet I will get regularly asked where I'm from, and I've been told that I look like I'm from Ethopia or Nigeria. It's interesting the assumptions that people bring up when they hear my last name. And we aren't even going to TALK aout how horribly people butcher the spelling and pronunciation of my name. Even after I tell them that it is spelled EXACTLY how it sounds - it rarely sinks in. I've gotten to the point that anytime I spell my name over the phone I have to do the phonetic version "B as in Boy, D as in Dog" - and yet I will STILL get items in the mail in which my name has been utterly warped into something different.

My new last name is almost a blessing after this one. It's not a super common last name, but it's so easy to prounouce, understand and spell, that I ALMOST don't mind changing it. I'm still going to keep my last name (I can't give it up THAT easily) but - I will most likely use my new name all the time. I still haven't settled in my head WHY I want to keep my old name if I only plan on using the new, but then, I haven't really thought about it that much either.

---

We've already picked out our children's names...and I'm not sure if that is a bad thing or a good thing. People often tell me that sometimes the name you pick changes when you actually SEE the kid, but the both of us are stuborn enough to want to keep them. The first boy will naturally be a Jr. despite all my pleas to the contrary, and the first girl will be Anjali Rylah. The middle name is a combo of both our mothers first names. It means jack-all, but it sounds good - and it's not utterly complex to spell. Anjali is a bastardazation of Anjelica - which is Spanish for 'Little Angel'. Yes, we are being quite the optimists. :)
I hope they like their names - but if they don't - I know I won't feel bad if they change it. After your apperance, your name is the thing most people learn next - and it's only right that they have a name that they feel fully represents who they are...