So my new idea came to me as we drove through rural Georgia, through a "town" (didn't have a stoplight, so can it really be a town?) called: "ila" (pronounced "eye-la"). I proclaimed to Audrey-- "Oooh, what a great word! I wanna name our kid Ila." She hated the idea: "No way!" she said. "It's weird."
"But it's like Lila without the L," I protested, "And thus much cooler!"
She was not persuaded. :( {Luckily we have about 10 years for me subconsciously influence her in her sleep by whispering it over and over into her ear... ila, ila, iiiillllaaa} :)
I don't know why I like Ila but I think it's a Southern thing. The names I love are a bit off, and yet with the promise of old-fashionedness. And like many things in life, I have strong opinions about them. I am, after all, a pretend-writer, which means I have strong opinions about many words. I love refreshing, crooked, and diaphanous. I hate pulchritude, palliative, and pregnant. And just to show I'm not prejudiced against p-words, I also hate: tit-for-tat (if that's a word?).
So I love the name Ila. I love double-names like Ila-James. I love boy's names made out of girl's names (Ashley) and girls names come from boy's names (Sammi). I have been told this gender-bending is, ironically, a Southern thing. I love family and older names like Celeste and Jackson (I also love Alyse, BTW Kacey). And I love "Audrey"-- b/c it is unique and old-fashioned. I love scientific names like Aurora and place-names like Charlotte and Tennessee (she could be called Ness-y- for short... then again the kids might make fun of her with "Lock-nesse monster"). :( I don't like popular names... ones they must hear over and over and turn their heads in the hall, only to find it is not to them. I had a dozen friends named Megan/Meghan and Christy/Kristi/Christie and Amy/Ami/Aimee and I watched how this bothered them. The strange spellings made no improvement.
I do not like generic one-syllable boy names that are hardly distinguishable from the next: John, Joe, Bob, Mike. This is like pop music.
I like names that are either very long and formal-sounding (Mariella, McKenzie) or so short as to be nick-names almost (i.e. "Jo" for a girl). I like tom-boyish names. I would be tempted to name my kid Scout. I do not like hippy-dippy names... the ones at Emma and Kenzie's school-- the out-there parents who call their kids "Lorax" or "Bear" (these are actual names, folks!), despite the well-meaning sentiment behind it. I do like the name Sequoia, however (one of their school-friends), and "Raven" is also okay (although I heard they made a TV show about a girl named Raven, so that's out). I do not like the names built after intangible ideas (though I can stand Grace or Faith, for some reason). For example, I don't like kids named: Destiny, Chastity (poor girl!), Constance, Felicity, or Harmony. I do like "Chance," though... and I guess technically that it's the same category (hmmm... I am very erratic in my loves).
I also hate the new trend of naming your God-damn children after brands! This is the ultimate ridiculousness and symbol of our over-commercialized society, when we've got children walking around named Lexus and Mercedes and Acura. They're cars, people, not kids! I knew a girl in college named Charmain (like the toilet paper), but that might be a real name in France? (She was not from France. Her parents were white trash and wanted her to sound fancy).
I love writer's names and once planned to name my child Zora (after Zora Neale Hurston). I just can't seem to find a partner who would go with that. But hey-- it could be Harper (after Harper Lee) or Flannery (after Flannery O'Connor)... which is probably worse. If we had a boy we could call him Faulkner or Tennesssee (after Tennessee Williams).
I used to love the name Jacob but it has now been the most popular boy's name for the last 10 years so I gotta give up on it. I believe in diversity. (But would not name my kid: Diversity). :)
I don't know why I am off on this long tangent about names, except to procrastinate from working on my novel (where the main characters are named: Tennelina, Sammi, Knox, Andy, Emily-James, Will, Willie, and Liza). I suppose it was passing through Ila, and then the fact that as I write this my friend Marci is in labor with her first child, to be named: Mila (pronounced Me-la). I think it is a beautiful name, though I forget what it means. I never saw the connnection betwen the two names until I just now wrote them down. Strange, the mind. I must have a thing for 'i-l-a." I do love the name Camille (but not Camilla).
3 comments:
funny funny funny.
So, what you're saying is that you don't like my choice for my new first name? Hmm.
I always try to go by my last name, though. There aren't many Rakers out there at all :)
Great post! I like the name Ila a lot. I had so many name ideas for our son, but having to choose a name with someone else is a challenge. Evan was the only name we agreed on and it is the Welsh version of John, which is a prominent name in my husband's family, even with the women. Alex's grandmother (from the South) was named Mary John and her mom's name was Tom John. I always loved that! The brand names for babies are horrible--Nautica and Armani are ones that I hear in NYC alot.
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