What's in a (baby) name

One of the parenthood pleasures I missed out on by not having children was not being able to name the baby.

How much fun it must be to come up with your lists, add to them, scratch names off them, narrow them down, pick the perfect girl name, the perfect boy name, decide whether to share the name with friends and families or surprise them, and then wait for the baby to arrive and decide whether the name fits or you need to revisit your choice.

What would I have named the baby? 

I haven't given it a ton of thought, although if I'd had a daughter she would likely have been an Elizabeth. My favorite name. My mother's name. My middle name. So, probably Elizabeth, with first runner up honors going to Mairead, if I'd been in an Irish mode. 

If that mythic girl had been a boy, it might have been Alexander, so I could have named him (sort of) after my father, Al, without having to give him the dreaded name Albert, which my father never liked. Or it might have been Matthew. A good, old fashioned name - and a shout out to one of my great-grandfathers. In Irish mode, I'd have gone with Liam or Aidan. 

Anyway, I just find it unfathomable that someone would want to outsource the naming of their children. It seems to me that there are some things that money just can't buy. And one of them is your baby's name.

But apparently there are some people who find it way too overwhelming. So they hire a professional baby namer. Like Taylor Humphrey, who was profiled recently in The New Yorker. 

Last year, she helped name more than a hundred kids. Indecisive parents can choose from Humphrey’s services, which start at fifteen hundred dollars and range from a phone call and a bespoke name list (based on parents’ answers to a questionnaire) to a genealogical investigation, with the aim of ferreting out old family names. A ten-thousand-dollar option involves selecting a name that will be on-brand with a parent’s business. (Source: The New Yorker - may require a subscription)

FFS. "Bespoke name list." FFS, "On-brand with a parent's business." FFS. Even if she just made her minimum 100 times, that's $150K. FFS.

The article has her reviewing a list of boys' names with a client. They reject Bohdi because "it's so popular." Bohdi? Where've I been? Has Bohdi replaced Jacob, Henry, and Aiden (misspelled Aidan, in my opinion) on the "so popular" list? The client also rejected Arlo and Astro, but they stopped on Brave. Might work for a first name. If not a middle name. 

Brave. Brave? FFS.

It's interesting how names come and go.

When I was a kid, living in a largely Irish-Catholic area, the name Maureen was very common. Now it's about as popular as Ethel and Bertha. 

Then there's the name Milo, which when I was growing up was heard only on Westerns as the name of the town's old codger. Or, later, as a character in Catch 22. Milo Minderbinder. Or Milo in The Phantom Tollbooth. Then, all of a sudden, Milos were everywhere. 

How everywhere were Milos? 

Both my husband and I have (had in Jim's case) first cousins with grandsons named Milo. So I'm related, however distantly, to two Milos. 

And I'm pretty sure the parents of those Milos came up with the names without paying a consultant $1,500. 

Sometimes, Humphrey - whose active on Insta and TikTok - gives advice away for free. 

On TikTok, she responds to people who post questions, mainly seeking help finding complementary sibling names. What’s a good boy name to go with Calliope? “Oh, my God, Calliope is a baby namer’s dream!” she says, in a video response. Her suggestions: Florian, Barabas, Roscoe, Stavros, and Balthazar.

Roscoe is on my list for a dog name (maybe on its own, maybe short for Roscommon if I'm in the Irish mode I never got to be in for a baby). But Stavros if you're not Greek? And isn't Balthazar a restaurant in NYC? 

But Barabas. Barabas? As in "give us Barabas?" F.F.S.

Some of Humphrey's clients come to her for help when they're having their 3rd or 4th child, and have run out of names, having squandered all their naming capacity on Number One and Number Two. 

Seriously, how did my parents manage to come up with six names - make that 12: first+ middle - without outside assistance? And how about the families in the 'hood who had 8+ kids, and there were plenty of them? Jeez Louise. Or jeez Louisa. Or jeez Lulu.

I'm pretty sure they weren't combing through the Social Security database. How would they have found it? here was no such thing as a database. And surely they didn't "mine film credits," as Humphrey does. 

Humphrey also combs through genealogical records to suss out hidden gems among family names. I just don't get it. Why don't people just pay for a few months on ancestry.com and do their own sussing out?

And if you're so at a loss, I believe they still sell 'what to name the baby' books. 

What's up with people too busy, lazy, or overwhelmed by life to name their own kids? And if they can't do it themselves, everybody has someone they can ask for suggestions. And I've never known anyone who was asked for a baby name suggestion who didn't offer one or two up. Sometimes they'll offer them up even - get this - they're not asked. (Years ago, I was asked by a friend and colleague. I threw the name Noah in the ring, and damned if they didn't name the baby Noah. Maybe it was in the ring already, but I like to think it was my suggestion.)

Some also hire Humphrey as a doula. 

Wonder if you can get a package deal on baby naming and doula.