I thought long and hard before I named my children. They probably would tell you that I thought long and hard about making their names difficult. But that’s not true. I wanted them to have names of substance, that meant something to me, and eventually would mean something to them. I’m lucky that they haven’t all lined up to legally change their name. But to me their names sing from my heart.
I named my first-born Jamison Dale Pierce Gravatte. I loved the name Jamison. But I also knew that I wouldn’t call him that so decided on Jay. I didn’t want him to be Jamie or Jimmy. Besides the minute he was born he just sort of looked like a “Jay”. Dale is my daddy’s middle name. Honestly when he was born I told my mother I was going to name him after my daddy, Freddie Dale. My mother told me that was not going to happen. She told me that my daddy hated his name. I never knew. But Dale went with Jamison and would sound really good when I got mad and had to holler “Jamison Dale!” And it does. I named him Pierce also in honor of my daddy. My daddy was an only son. My daddy only had one son. Even though I didn’t know it at the time my brother only had daughters. I didn’t want to lose the name of Pierce. I love that name. That is who I am. And I wanted my son to share that with me. Gravatte was in honor of my son’s father. Okay, it’s also our custom.
But, poor Jay. And honestly, other than Gravatte his name is pretty easy. But then again, not.
My daughter was born a couple of years after my mother died. I couldn’t help it. I had to name her after my mother. I should have been sensible, like my sister, and used a derivative of my mother’s name. But no sir. I had to saddle my poor child with that name. It’s a good thing she has turned out to be the woman that she is because she got a doozy in the name department: Carilynn Noelle Pierce Gravatte. My grandmother gave birth to twin girls on Christmas day. She named one Marilynn and the other Carilynn. She changed the spelling of both names so that they would match. So my mother went through life with that name. And I saddled my daughter with the spelling. Honestly, I thought she would nickname herself. But the minute she could talk she called herself Carilynn. Some people called her Cari-lynn but I didn’t. I have a brother named Kerry. I mentioned this to him and he told me that his whole life we had tried to convince him that Kerry was a boy’s name and here I wanted to name my daughter after him. He had a point. So, Carilynn it was (pronounced Carolyn). I named her Noelle because I was due with her around Christmas. She was born the last Sunday of the Christmas season. I spelled it like the French would spell it. I’m sorry that the rest of the world didn’t know that. But I love that name. She was named Pierce in honor of my daddy and Gravatte in honor of her daddy.
She got such a triple whammy. But it has helped to make her the person she is. She married a man named Coombs. It’s pronounced “combs”. That one’s not my fault.
Fast forward ten years. I had remarried to a man who had never been married and didn’t have any children. We discussed having children. We didn’t discuss what we would name them. So when we had our daughter I knew that I wanted to name her after Scarlett O’Hara. But I couldn’t fathom naming a daughter Scarlett. I wasn’t from the deep south. And I wasn’t that mean. So I decided to name her Katie, after Katie Scarlett O’Hara. But I wanted a substantial name for her so that Katie could be her nickname. I decided on Katharine. You noticed that “a” didn’t you? I named her Katharine after Katharine Graham, the publisher of the Washington Post. So in one fell-swoop I named her after a couple of really strong-willed women. One of my favorite stories in the Bible came from the book of Ruth. And I was so very lucky that my mother-in-law, Katie’s grandmother, was named Ruth. This was the name I wanted her to have. And yes, I named her Pierce in honor of my daddy and Elder in honor of her daddy.
She probably has the easiest name of all. Except that John Wayne starred in a movie called “The Sons of Katie Elder”. Not a lot of people remember that movie but those that do get just as excited about her name as I did when I put two and two together.
When I was pregnant with Katie I didn’t have a boy’s name picked out. In fact with each of my children I didn’t have an opposite sex name picked out. Luckily I was right about the sex of each of my children. But when I was in labor with Katie I threw my rosary at Jimmy and told him he needed to start praying because if the baby was a boy I was going to name him John. I don’t know where that came from. But when I was pregnant for the last time I prayed that the baby would be a boy. I would have been happy either way. But there was a priest who was almost a member of my family. He had been best friends with my mother from the time she was in high school, and we all loved him dearly. He was our family priest. And his name was John. We never knew that. We thought his name was Fr. Dickman. But we loved him dearly and I thought one of the best ways to honor him was to name a son after him. I knew that Jimmy’s best friend’s name was John. I knew that Jimmy’s dad’s name was John. I knew that Jimmy had a nephew named John. I wanted to name him after Fr. Dickman but I had no intention of calling him that. I used to tease and say we were going to call him Fr. Dickman for short. But I had a name picked out. I was going to name him Elijah. That was a strong name. I was going to call him Eli. I loved that name. When I told Jimmy about it he mentioned that his dad’s middle name was Elisha. I had no idea. So I was still going to name him Eli but it would be short for Elisha instead of Elijah. The minute that baby was born I took one look at him and said “oh my gosh, it’s John Elder”. That baby was the spitting image of his grandfather. I couldn’t call him Eli. His name was John. I still laugh about that. So, I named him John in honor of Fr. Dickman (and all of the other John’s in his life), Elisha in honor of his grandfather (see how easy it was to get those brownie points), Pierce in honor of my daddy, and Elder in honor of his daddy.
John really has had the easiest name. He should thank me. But one thing that’s so funny is that we live in the house that Jimmy was raised in. We still have the same phone number his dad had. So when people would call the house when John was little and ask for John Elder I would hand him the phone. They were trying to sell something so I thought it served them right. Anymore though the call is for my son.
But there are a few things that make me mad about my name. One is that in the state of Kentucky they don’t have enough room to put your middle name on your driver’s license. My middle name is now Pierce. So on my driver’s license it is “Pie”. Every time I see that I want a piece of pie. I recently had to pull out John’s birth certificate. On that they have my middle name as “Lee”. Actually my middle name is “Lu”. Do you want to know that I have to move heaven and earth and have it notorized in order to get that changed? But I think the one that’s got my heart right now is that I have a grandson (named Alexander Creed Coombs). I have decided that he will call me Grandmama, shortened to Mama (pronounced Ma Ma). My daughter wants to spell that MawMaw. That reminds me of a bird. My name is Mama. If she wants to she can capitalize both m’s. I know what she’s doing, she has always called me Mama so she is taking on that name. That is fine. But the spelling can be the same, just the pronunciation would be different. Oh, I’m taking that name after my grandmother, Mama.
I don’t think I’ve done too bad by the names I have given my children. They have all grown up into their names. I believe that they will serve them well. And even though the spelling might be off in some ways it’s not like I made up the names. And I am so blessed that the people who they are named after will live on if only in my heart and the stories that I tell them about their namesakes.