3 Months: Name Game - Flapper Names

As I've mentioned before, I get a lot of traffic to this site from people searching Google for "flapper names". I did some research today and found out why... there's really nowhere on the web, that I can find, where flapper names are listed—neither specific, famous flappers nor a generalized list of flapper-sounding names.

So here is the beginning of a list of flapper names. Some of these are inspired by actual flappers (Isadora), or fictional flappers (Daisy), and some are just names that sound to me like they'd work well for a flapper girl of the 1920's.

Please do comment with suggestions for additions.

Waldron's list of Great Flapper Names:

• Daisy
• Dixie
• Evelyn
• Fanny
• Frances
• Isadora
• Lillian
• Louisa
• Norma
• Olive
• Zelda

Update: we should also include

• Fern
  

10 Weeks: Name Game - Bad Names Article

Saw an article in the New York Times online, A Boy Named Sue, and a Theory of Names. It didn't give me too much new information; having a unique, bad, or cross-gendered name doesn't necessarily have long-term negative consequences (as research from decades past had suggested). Most significant thing I learned is that there exists an American Names Society. From their website I learned that there exists an academic field of study around names and naming practices. It's called onomastics, and it includes naming of all things, not just people... place-names, thing-names, etc. The Wikipedia article on the subject mentions a sub-branch of onomastics, anthroponomastics, the study of names of human beings, and the subject near and dear to the heart of this blog.

Even before I learned all this, I already had some doubts about some of the things I wrote in my last Name Game post - much of which I presented as statements of fact even though they're really mostly just personal aesthetics. I'll spend some time researching the given wisdom on this subject so that I might assess my own theories against those of people who actually know what they're talking about. Stay tuned.

10 Weeks: Name Game - Syllables & Cadence

My friend Martha made a good comment on my Name Game - How-To post, regarding syllables in kids' names. She is of the opinion that, to prevent shortening and lengthening of first names, two syllables is the optimal number for a kid's first name.

I don't necessarily disagree, but I don't think you can really prevent people from inventing little nicknames, regardless of how many syllables. Nicknaming is less about shortening than it is about making something accessible, easy, less formal. My name, Waldron, has only two syllables, yet people have been wanting and trying to call me Wally and Waldo forever. I fully expect August to have to spend some effort fending off Auggie... or accepting it, which I hope doesn't happen!

So as an addendum to my How-To post, here are some guidelines on syllables and cadence, some of which I had previously touched on in my Rules post, back when we were still searching for a name.

• An odd number of syllables is more rhythmic
  

The normal speaking cadence in English favors an odd number of syllables. If your last name has an even number of syllables, then you're in luck, because you can make it so that no matter what "version" of your child's name someone is using, there will be an odd number of syllables.

The three main "versions" of identifying a person are First (Eliot), First-Last (Eliot Faulkner), and Full (Eliot Watson Faulkner). If first-middle-last goes odd-even-even, then each version will turn out with an odd number of syllables.

Many will note that we didn't follow this advice ourselves. Just goes to show that all advice and wisdom must be taken with grains of salt and weighed against other factors. In our defense, I will say that having all the names use the same number of syllables creates a rhythm all its own, especially in the Full version. And that our son's name has the feel of a quarter-note for each name... August is just two eights and Eliot is two sixteenths followed by an eight... both have the same duration, really.

• Keep stressed syllables separate

Assuming you agree, why do you think Lainey Faulkner works and Elaine Faulkner doesn't feel like it works as well? Again, because of the rhythms we tend to use when speaking in English, it's best if the stressed syllables in a name are separated by one or more unstressed syllables. AUgust WATson FAULKner flows. But eLAINE FAUlkner doesn't. It's not a knock on the name Elaine, which is beautiful, but it works best when paired with a last name which doesn't begin with a stressed syllable. For example, it works great for my friend eLAINE mcCLAY.

It's all because, in English, we swing our speech... think iambic pentameter. Elsewhere, speech has more a "march" feel, or a jungle beat feel, or something else. They all call for different cadences and therefore, names don't always sound ideal across languages. We prefer Elaine, with the downbeat on LAINE. Elsewhere, they prefer Elena, downbeat on EL. Cadence matters, and it's cultural.

9 Weeks: Name Game - Ten "Worst" of 2007

Article today on MSN on the 10 worst names of 2007. Specifically, they mean ten names celebrities used which failed to impress the editors of Nest Baby.

I'll say this up front... I actually suggested one of these names when Mary and I were hunting around for new material, after we had blogged all our other choices to smithereens. It never got passed the "how about Blah" stage, but nevertheless! I'll leave it to you to guess which was suggested. The 10 worst, for the record, were:

• Ptolemy
• Magnus
• E-
• Story
• Ever
• Heaven Rain
• Alabama
• Princess
• Evan (for a girl)
• Superman

OK, so Ever was the name I thought might have been a possibility for us. It was just me trying to get close to Everett, which was another name I liked.

The problem is that celebrities can get away with naming their kids all kinds of whacky things the rest of us just couldn't. It's not fair to judge them... in a way, the sort of need to go off the deep end when they name their kids.

To me, the worst names of 2007 are actually the most popular names from 2007. Top 5 each, for boys and girls, were:

• Aidan
• Ava
• Braden
• Abigail
• Kaden
• Cailyn
• Ethan
• Madeline
• Caleb
• Isabella

On the surface, some of these aren't bad, but the very fact that they were in the top 5 for popularity of the gender has to be an immediate strike against each.

Isabella made an appearance on our list of possibilities for girls because it was the only name we knew that could actually save a girl some money. We learned that the charter for the Isabella Stuart Gardner museum here in Boston states that any girl named Isabella gets free admission. If the trend continues for the name Isabella they may have to revisit that policy.

For those of you who didn't pick up on it, four of the top seven boys' names for 2007 were Aiden, Braden, Kaden, and Jaden. Are you kidding me!? Hayden was #11 in 2006 (dropped to 54th this past year). Ethan was #4; doesn't perfectly rhyme, but still... close enough. I have an apparently trend-setting friend who named her son Caden about a year ago... much better with the C than the K, but we've covered that before.

9 Weeks: Name Game - How-To

Since I'm such a philosopher about names and naming kids, and since I'm doling out so much unsolicited advice, and acting like the baby-naming expert, I thought it couldn't hurt for me to create a guide, a sort of How-To on choosing a baby name.

Here goes:

• Always remember, you're choosing a name on behalf of your child.

Most of my suggestions are guided by this single, over-arching principle. In an ideal world, people would choose their own names, but since it'd be at least 20-25 years until they'd be able to choose an appropriate name for themselves (maybe more!), that duty falls to you. So this is not an event you should use to satisfy your own little whims, or to honor an ancestor, living or dead. It's not to make your parents happy. Tradition is nice, but the question isn't whether your family will be happy that you've followed a family baby-naming tradition, it's whether you think your kid, in his/her world, will be happy to have been a part of it. All of you who are naming your children Barack—I understand the sentiment, but your child may not grow up to fully appreciate it. It's her name, not your name for her. It's his name, not a family legacy.

• Keep your name-selection process private.

I blogged about this in detail previously, so I'll only recap here: outsiders will rarely take the exercise as seriously as the parents, so outsiders' advice tends not to be as thoroughly considered. Also, outside advice gets more weight/credibility than it merits, and distorts parents' thinking processes.

• Imagine a broad range of possible "life contexts" when considering possibilities.

I get a ton of traffic to this blog from people searching the keywords "cowboy names" and "flapper names". If you're a Texas cowboy yourself, you may well think it appropriate to assign your kid a great cowboy name. But it may not be a safe assumption that your kid will become a cowboy, or stay in Texas where the name Buck might be considered kind of cool, rather than awkward, silly, provincial. We weren't satisfied with any name we didn't think would work equally well for a senator, a rock star, an athlete, or an author. If we had been more comprehensive we'd also have spent more time considering regional effects. August will work great if spends a lot of time in Europe. But for all we know, in California, or the deep south, it might only ever be used for girls these days. If it is, our kid may someday grow to resent the name.

• Be cognizant of the current trends.

Why does the name Mabel instantly conjure the impression of an old lady? It's because Mabel was a hot, trendy name in the late 19th century, and its popularity tailed-off suddenly in the earlier part of the 20th century. In the decade starting 1900, about 0.5% of babies (about 1% of girls) were named Mabel. By the 1930's, the name was about 1/100th as popular, being given to about 0.005% of babies (.01% of girls). Today it doesn't even register. In the 1990's, Justin was the 17th most popular name for boys (60% more popular than Mabel was in the 1900's!). It came out of nowhere; but in the 1960's it was just 301st most popular. Now it's beginning to tail off. Boys who were named Justin in the 1980's will never feel they were given a strange name, and I can tell you from experience that being a young kid with a weird name isn't always pleasant. But now that I'm an adult, I really like having a unique name, and Justins will never feel that way. If the current trend for Justin continues, by about 2050 or 2060, the name Justin will seem just as antique as the name Edgar does today. Most parents know the Name Voyager. I recommend it as a tool for researching current and past naming trends.

• Give the kid options.

Regardless of what you decide to call your kid, think about giving him/her as flexible a name as possible—go with the longer form, even if you plan to use a shorter form. Before we knew we were having a boy, Mary and I spent some time debating possible girls' names. I've always been partial to the name Katie, and for that reason, suggested we name a daughter Katherine. Mary liked Kate, but not necessarily Katherine. Her idea was that we could possibly just name the child Kate; we could use Kate or Katie day to day, and we could avoid Katherine (which is a fine name, just not our favorite). I thought that even if we never used Katherine in its full form, we should still name the kid Katherine so that she could go by that more formal sounding name later in life, if she wanted/needed to. Mary and I disagreed on this. Personally, I don't see why we'd intentionally limit the possibilities open to a child just because we didn't love a name... maybe she would love it. I don't think Mary is convinced on this point as of right now, but this is my blog so... there it is!

• Consider all the permutations.

It's advice you'll find in almost every baby book, but it bears repeating. Be sure you're not accidentally giving your child awkward initials (no one wants their luggage emblazoned "ASS"), or something can sound like something else (Shanda Lear), or combine amusingly with your last name (Barry Coffin). Don't forget to check initials in combination with the last name. If your name is Farf, don't give your child the first name Roger (R. Farf). People spend a lot of time worrying about how nicknames might be twisted around on the playground and used as teasing material, but other than for ridiculously mockable names, I'm not sure it's worth worrying too much about that. If a kid's going to be teased it'll happen regardless of his/her name. Bullies are perfectly happy choosing a new name to use for teasing, so you're really not providing any real shelter.

• Enjoy!

I thought the process of choosing our boy's name was a lot of fun, if sometimes wrought with peril! Enjoy it, and good luck!

8 Weeks: Name Game - Don't Ask, Don't Tell

My sister is expecting her first baby (also a boy), and at the tail-end of an email on an unrelated subject, she enumerated a short list of names she and her husband are considering.

My response took her by surprise: I advised her to keep her ideas to herself. Obviously, she called foul, as I had exposed our name-selection process to the entire Internet, not to mention family & friends.

Mary and I would probably not do another public exposure of our name-selection thinking process. We definitely recommend keeping your list to yourself, for four simple reasons:

• Outsiders can have an unjustifiably large influence on your thinking/perception.
• Once you've put a name out into the wild, you'll feel that you've set expectations.
• Inviting others to participate in your name selection process may invite more participation than you bargained for.
• There's a disconnect between how seriously you, as a parent, will take the naming process compared with marginally-involved outsiders.
  

To elaborate on the above:

• Your favorite little name(s) are certain to find some people who don't "get it"; you just can't please everyone. But those few dissenters get inside your head and distort your perception of what might otherwise be a perfectly good name. They can put you off a front-running favorite, even though the individual might represent an extreme outlier for how a name will be perceived.
  
• The same distortion can happen in the opposite direction. A well-meaning friend might actively lobby for a name on which you'd otherwise be just so-so.
  
• If you manage to ignore the undue influence of vocal individuals, you're still not out of the woods: if someone close to you has a less-than-positive reaction to a name, you might hesitate to use it just because you don't want to offend that person.
  
• You might be surprised by the degree to which people are willing to share their opinions and get involved. Your idea might be to get a quick "positive/negative" reaction to a particular name, but once you invite someone's opinion, it can be delivered vociferously and revisited frequently.
• Especially for individuals outside your family, and even inside your family, nobody except you will treat your name selection process with appropriate weight. Somebody out there just loves the idea that some kid, somewhere, should be named Roxtar (lookin' at you, Andrew!). If it can be your kid, that's great, because you can bet they'd never use it themselves! Same problem affects the level of critical feedback you get when you yourself suggest a bad name idea. "Peach? Sure, why not... that'd be kind of a cute name... I guess. Yeah! Why not?! Do it!" Your friends simply don't have enough skin in the game to be useful in the long, arduous, and important name-selection process.
  
• Name selection should be a discussion (if not negotiation!) between two parents. We found that when we took our naming ideas to our separate groups of friends, those friends tended to reinforce our own positions. All my friends loved the name Emmet and all Mary's friends thought Eliot was perfect. This is understandable; your friends want to be supportive. But all that positive feedback from friends unduly reinforces your confidence that you have indeed made the right choice, and how can your stupid spouse just not get it!? It creates over-confidence in your preconceptions, and tends to make it harder to listen to a spouses reasoned considerations. It creates division when you really need to be coming together.

I will say that Mary was more susceptible to the negative effects of going public with our name selection process than I was... the sad truth is that I don't care if someone close to me hates a name and we use it anyway! But I do think that outside influences colored (or unduly strengthened) both of our perceptions, for better and worse, of certain name candidates. I still say the ultimate demise for my long-time first-choice, Emmet, was that a friend of Mary's told her it was common in Appalachia. Emmet never stood a chance after that!

Many people have asked how we ever arrived at August, since it was never really on the shortlist. People thought it came out of nowhere. (For the record, it was on the final list, and also evaluated in my fancy spreadsheet, where it ranked second among 12 names). The honest truth is that, toward the end there, we got sick of hearing people's opinions. With only a few weeks left, Mary decided she wanted to find a name that wasn't on any list, and keep it off this blog, keep it hidden. I despaired that we'd be able to do that because we had already worked very hard to find candidates we liked, and every single one of them had been blogged. I honestly thought we had considered every realistic possibility for us, at that time. I still do!

We talked less and less frequently about the subject as the due date approached, because it had been the source of rather a lot of conflict... possibly because we had been so public with the process. We had talked very briefly of reconsidering August a couple of weeks before the due date, and then just dropped it. Even after he was born we avoided discussing the matter until it wasn't realistic to do so any longer. Everyone asks you what you've named your baby!

After having witnessed what Mary had gone through in process of labor, I decided that she could choose to name him whatever she wanted... it should be her prerogative. But by then we had it down to Eliot and August. August won partially because I liked it better and mostly because it wasn't really on anyone's radar. As of today I'm very happy with the choice. Whether August himself will be happy or not remains to be seen, and that was really the objective... give him a name he loved, which would serve him well at all stages of life and regardless of what he should choose to do with it.

5 Weeks: Name Game - English Rock Star Edition

One of the criteria we considered when we were choosing a name was: could our kid use this name to front a rock band? Not sure we found that with August (probably he can get away with it), but it forces one to ask oneself: what are rocks star names?

Here, then, is my list of great English rock star names:

• Nigel
• Roger
  
• Mick
  
• Keith
  
• Sid/Syd
• Nick

If I were inventing a fictional six-piece English rock group, these would be their names. Any other suggestions?

2 Weeks: Cowboy Names Revisited

Most of the non-family traffic that comes to this blog comes from people searching for baby names on Google and being directed to one or more of my posts on the topic. The number-one most-common search term that brings people to this site? "flapper names". Followed closely thereafter by "cowboy names".

If my blog is in the top page of results for a Google search on "cowboy names", I feel I should give some real direction on the subject, because there are many pitfalls awaiting a well-meaning prospective parent who like the idea of a cowboy name. So I have compiled my list of Great Cowboy Names, any of which I recommend, provided the child will have a last name strong enough to carry it:

• Casey
• Clay
• Clem
• Clint
• Clyde
• Eldon
• Floyd
• Grant
• Hank
• Harlan
• Hoyt
• Jake
• Luke
• Roy
• Travis
• Wyatt

But beware. There are a number of options people think are great cowboy names, but which are in fact, fake cowboy names... cowboy wannabe names. These are the names people give their kids when they're trying too hard. Please do avoid any name on my list of Fake Cowboy Names:

• Cash
• Cody
• Cole
• Colt
• Dakota
• Dallas
• Harley
• Shane
• Stetson
• Tanner
• Trace
• Zane

What about Dale, Duane, or Darrell? Stay tuned for possible future list of redneck names.


One book we loved as a name-choosing aid was "Cool Names for Babies" by Pamela Redmond Satran & Linda Rosenkrantz. We didn't get the name August out of it, though I notice it is listed there, under Authors' Names. This book doesn't have a section for cowboy names, but it was definitely a fun book to read through, and does divide names by subject-area.

0 Days: Name Game - Final Edition

August Watson Faulkner
Born Dec. 29, 2007 - 3:23 AM
8lbs, 7.6oz - 21" long.
Beautiful, strong, perfect!

Mother: also beautiful, strong, perfect.

Day 272: Random Updates

Took Mary to the obstetrician this morning. No major physiological changes since a week ago, which is disappointing because Mary is finally beginning to feel like something is changing. "I definitely feel more ready now than I did a few days ago".

While there, we discovered that the hospital had been expecting us for inducement on the 30th, not the 31st, so now we're scheduled for inducement on Sunday, if necessary. I still have the feeling we won't need to wait that long. But if we do, it's good to start Sunday, rather than on the 31st, because it improves the chances that the baby will be born in 2007, which would confer a considerable tax benefit to us. So that's good news.

Meanwhile, we may have come to some resolution regarding the name. Not sure yet. Stay tuned.

Day 231: Actual Research

It's official. What you name your child does matter! In a recent study, researchers have concluded that students with names that begin in with A and B get better grades than students whose names begin with C and D. Also, that fondness for one's own name will cause a potentially damaging bias toward people, places, or institutions with similar names. For example, Philadelphia attracts a disproportionate number of Philips, Phyllises and the like, and Jacks and Jackies tend to move to Jacksonville in higher-than-exptected numbers.

So I guess Detroit Faulkner is out of the question.

Day 220: Name Game - A Final List

We have eight weeks left, if we're lucky. It's getting down to the wire, and I feel the need to push us closer to consensus on a name for this kid. We have a working list of every name we've given even the slightest consideration. Since my scientific approach failed (when I tried to apply a fancy spreadsheet to the problem of arriving at a compromise), I thought I might try something more straight-forward this time. Simple ranking.

I took the top dozen names from the "scientific approach" (some of which aren't under serious consideration at this point, but whatever). I ordered them randomly, then asked Mary to rank them from favorite to least favorte. I did the same. My list, in order, is:

• Emmett
• Everett
• Addison
• Elliot
• Clement
• Watson
• Reik
• Robert
• August
• Emerson
• Lincoln
• Waldron

Side note for the uninitiated: the name Reik is pronounced "rake"... at least that's how we're saying it, and it comes from the Scottish ancestors on my mother's side.

Mary's list looks like this:

• Elliot
• Reik
• Addison
• August
• Everett
• Emmett
• Emerson
• Waldron
• Watson
• Lincoln
• Clement
• Robert

So I took the ordinal position of each name, in each list, and averaged them. For example, in my list, Clement is 5th. In Mary's list, it's 11th. The average average 5 and 11 is 8. Clement gets a score of 8. I then ordered the list according to each name's score.

• Elliot - 2.5
• Addison - 3
• Emmett - 3.5
• Everett - 3.5
• Reik - 4.5
• August - 6.5
• Watson - 7.5
• Clement - 8
• Emerson - 8.5
• Robert - 10
• Waldron - 10
• Lincoln - 10.5

If we were to compromise using this method, Elliot would win.

I've redone the poll again. This time for the last time, I promise. The top five names from this methodology are now open for voting, as is the "something else" option. Please do make your one selection. Mary and I will be refraining from voting, to see what people really think. We'll very likely then be ignoring what people really think when we finally reach our decision!

The problem I have with these methods of finding a compromise is that, in the end, I just don't want to compromise. I want to use the name that I like best. I've asked Mary to take some time with the idea of Emmett, to look at it again, ponder it for a few days, try it on for size, in her mind, as the name of our boy. Who knows... maybe it'll grow on her.

So what's your vote?

Day 200: Name Game - By The Numbers

So we've run the numbers on a few names, including both our favorite names and a few that aren't really in the running. The results:

Addison:	11.90
Elliot:	11.25
August:	11.00
Emerson:	10.88
Everett:	9.75
Reik:	8.50
Clement:	8.25
Waldron:	8.25
Emmett:	8.00
Lincoln:	7.50
Robert:	7.25
Watson:	6.08
Amos:	1.00

We used the following weights:

Cheesy:	-3.00
Hippy Name:	-2.00
Neg. Subjectivity:	-2.00
"er":	-1.75
Incongruous:	-1.50
Bad Association:	-1.50
Alliteration:	-1.00
Bad Initials:	-1.00
Trendy:	-1.00
Common:	-1.0
Bad Cadence:	-1.00
Poor Shortener:	-0.50
Wimpy:	-0.50
False Honor:	-0.50
Pretentious:	-0.30
Taken:	-0.25
Odd Syllables:	0.33
Cowboy:	0.50
Punch:	0.50
Literary:	1.00
Rockstar:	1.00
Gravitas:	1.00
Pos. Subjectivity:	2.0
Family:	2.0

In each of these categories we scored names giving values between 0 and 3. In the case of Watson, we gave a score of 20 in the "Taken" category. That was the way we could push the score down low enough... we're not naming the child after the dog. But if there were no dog, there's a good chance Watson would be the name.

As of now, Addison and Elliot are the front-runners. Not sure how August is scored so highly, must be something weird in the weights or the individual scores for the name August. We'll see how it fares as the model evolves.

Day 199: Name Game - Scientific Approach

I've built a preliminary model for quantifying name candidates. Click the image to see a screenshot of the first-pass.



The names are given a score in any applicable category. The standard score is 2, but it can be reduced to 1 if the name only mildly fits the category, or raised to 3 if the name strongly fits the category. For example, Reik is a family name, but it's pretty distant, and by marriage, so it gets only a 1 in the "Family" category. Whereas Robert is the name of a grandfather whom I admire greatly, so that gets a 3 in that category. These values are arbitrary, of course. Any values can be used (scale of 1-10, if you like) provided all categories are scored on the same scale.

The categories themselves are given weights relative to each other, both positive and negative. In this first pass, I've decided that having a pretentious sounding name is only half as bad as having a name that's trendy, which is only half as bad as a name with double "er"s. On the other hand, having a family reference is twice as good as having the coolness of a name with rock star potential.

This is just a first pass at my own weighting and scoring... these probably aren't my final weights. And it doesn't take any of Mary's preferences into account. We'll have to give her a sheet of her own, or agree to the weights and scores by agreement and compromise.

It's fun to build a model like this, but I can almost guarantee that the name we end up using won't be the winner according to any quantifiable scoring system. Not unless we tweak the weights and scores to make it come out the way we like! I've built enough numerical models to know that it almost never works out that way... even though we do have both negative and positive "subjectivity" categories to use as catch-all for areas that aren't otherwise scored.

Day 199: Name Game - The Rules

Choosing a name for our boy has become the most contentious part of my relationship with Mary. I have a need to solve this problem, so I thought I'd post a revision of the "rules" we have for choosing a name. I'm hoping this will focus our thinking and our discussion on the matter, help us get to resolution so we can both feel good about what we're going to name this kid.

Previously, everything was treated as a hurdle which must be crossed. We've since learned that there are no names that magically pass all negative tests. There are names both Mary and I like which, by our own "rules", aren't perfect. So we'll keep the list of total nonstarters short, then explore categories which can grant positive associations, then look at what can detract from a name's appeal.

Non-starters
Any name with the following characteristics must be excluded:

• Alliterative names - anything with an F sound like. e.g. Frank Faulkner doesn't work.
• "er" names - e.g. Hunter Faulkner. Doesn't work. Neither does the family name Latimer, unfortunately. Technically, I guess these are also alliterative names, but we'll give them their own bullet, just to be clear.
  
• Bad initials - e.g. Elliot Latimer Faulkner. Breaks the "er" rule above, but mabye worse, has ELF for initials. Perhaps this shouldn't be a nonstarter, but it's an easy hurdle to cross so let's call it a rule.
• Cheesy names - Finesse, Gunner, Angel. These are sometimes used as boys' names. Not our boy, thanks. Angel I can forgive in a Latino context, but nowhere else.
  
• Hippy names - these don't really work with the literary-sounding Faulkner. Plus it paints him into a personality-corner. Sky Faulkner. Rain Faulkner. No.

Positive Points
Names get positive points if they can claim any of the following characteristics:

• Family names - positive points if the name is somewhere in either my or Mary's family tree. Much preferred, and grants immunity against negative points for pretentiousness (see below).
• Literary-sounding names - with a name like Faulkner, it'd be a shame to give him a name he couldn't proudly use on a book-jacket! Here I think Emerson (a family name somewhere on my side) might work well.
• Cowboy names that work with Faulkner - it's hard to find them, but with Mary's western heritage, any cowboy name that can actually work with Faulkner gets positive points. The name Emmett was the exception that broke the original "no cowboy names" rule. We think it's sort of a cowboy name, but maybe it's a down home name instead. Whatever.
• Rockstar names - I'd love to give our son a name he can use to front a rock band. I think Emmett also works in that capacity. My friend Andrew actually did suggest the name "Roxtar". Well played, sir!
• Gravitas - Addison Faulkner is a name you can take to the Senate if you need to. It'd be nice to start our boy off with a name that confers some gravitas. He can always shorten this type of name if it gets too cumbersome.
  
• Punch - we seem to favor names that start with, or at least contain, hard sounds and syllables. This accounts for the large number of names we've considered that start with E. Gives it a punch. One of the few complaints I've had with the name Waldron, in adult life anyway, is the absence of this kind of punch. The name Waldron Faulkner is so mushy sounding that it's sometimes difficult for me to pronounce! Punch is nice to have, for a boy.
  
• Odd number of syllables - Rhythmically speaking, you want the entire name, however it's configured, to have an odd number of syllables. Since Faulkner is even, we need an odd number in the first name, and then an even number in the middle name. This way, whether one pronounces just the first name, or the first and last, or the full name—it always contains an odd number.

Negative Points
Names are penalized—but perhaps not completely excluded—if they fall into any of the following categories:

• Incongruous with last name - this is the clause which encapsulates the hitherto nonstarting cowboy names and tough guy names. On reflection, we do like names which could fall into either of these two categories, but find they usually don't work well with the somewhat stuffy-sounding last name Faulkner. Rock Faulkner? Positive points for being a rock star name and for having an odd number of syllables, but just doesn't work.
• Common names - we're shying away from names like Michael and Andrew and James. I've enjoyed having a unique name, and Mary has disliked having an extremely common name. So we're going to give extra negative points for names that are "normal".
• Pretentious names - anything that sounds like it belongs in the country club (a condition that is sorely exacerbated when paired with Faulkner) gets negative points. However, as noted above, these negative points are nullified if the the pretentious name happens to be a family name. In my family, where Waldron, Winthrop, Avery and even Cuthbert all make multiple appearances on the family tree, we should have plenty of material to get past the pretentiousness clause.
• Taken names - it's disappointing when a friend or family member has used-up an otherwise promising name on their own child... or dog (looking at you, Sara).
• Poor shortener - many of the names we like suffer from this condition. Elliot shortens naturally to El or Elly. These are feminine (Elle and Ellie). Emerson and Emmet both shorten to Em or Emmy. These too are feminine. Clement shortens to an incongruous cowboy name: Clem. This could be counteracted (perhaps) by simply assigning our child an acceptable version of one of these names, or even an arbitrary nickname. Better get it done early, though.
• Bad cadence - remember the name Dexter? My only problem with this, after the fact that it's an "er" name, is that the shortened version, Dex, puts three consonant sounds in a row when matched with Faulkner. The "x" in Dex and the F in my last name make a "ksf" noise that I just can't get past. Of course, this isn't actually cadence, but I'm going to count it as similar to having a bad pattern of rhythmic stresses within the syllables of a name.
  
• Wimpy names - except in extreme cases (e.g. Pointdexter), wimpiness is subjective. I think many of the pretentious sounding country-club names in my family are a touch wimpy-sounding, and I have a slight "wimpy" connotation with Mary's favorite: Elliot.
• Trendy names - there could be names we like which have, for some reason, turned-up as popular in recent years. We'd prefer some level of assurance that our kid won't have to share his name with his classmates or coworkers.
  
• Bad association - we'd have to penalize any names that hold a negative (or maybe even neutral-but-strong) association for us because of people we've known in the past who had the name.
  
• False honor - if you had a friend or coworker who happened to share a name you liked, but wasn't the source of that name, you might hesitate to use that name for your child. The act might be misinterpreted as an intentional honor, rather than coincidence. The more unique the name, the greater the chance for awkwardness.
• Subjective dislike - if a name just doesn't strike your fancy, it must be demerited. Perhaps excluded altogether.

Now, exactly none of the names Mary and I have discussed so far have made it unscathed through the gauntlet of potential detraction I've outlined above. So from here there are only two things to be done. First—and anyone who really knows me knows this is always my first step—build a spreadsheet. Next, keep looking and try to find new names to compete with the current, imperfect candidates we've assembled so far: Elliot, Emmet, Clement, Emerson, Lincoln, Reik, Everett, and introducing into the mix Addison... resurrected from the list of names which had previously been excluded. Lets see if we can score these objectively.

Day 199: Another Poll Update

Trying out a few different names in the poll, again... Clement's back in the list. We're also interested to gauge reaction to the name Reik, which we would pronounce as "rake". It's a family name on my side... Scottish, we think. Reik definitely breaks some of the rules I outlined in my original boys' edition of the Name Game post. Specifically, I'd classify it as a "grand-sounding", "trying too hard", "yacht person" name like Rex or Max or Rafe. On the other hand, if he could get through childhood unscathed by the name, it'd be one very unique and (I think) very cool-sounding name to have, starting around age 15 or 16. I don't know if those types of names go stale once the person gets into old age. I could see it getting a bit stale, perhaps, starting maybe in your forties. Maybe younger? Or maybe never. But I do know you could absolutely front a rock band with the name Reik Faulkner.

Having a name that one could never out-grow or become too distinguished for, I don't feel qualified to speculate on what happens to people with super-cool names as they age. And, of course, this all assumes that "Reik" actually would be a super-cool name. Many might dispute the assumption!

Thoughts and votes are hereby solicited.

Day 168: Poll Update

You'll notice I'm starting over with a fresh poll. We're not that fond of the name Clement (one friend told Mary it sounds like a disease), and Everett has now emerged as a front-runner. I know I said Everett was excluded "for family reasons" back on Day 114, but on reflection, the reasons aren't good enough to warrant an exclusion!

So Clement is out, and Everett is now in. Unfortunately, in order to make this change, I've had to throw out previous votes, so if you would, please vote again.

Day 128: Cowboy Names Revisited

One of the reasons I like the name Emmett, and the reason it's getting any play at all with Mary, is that it's a way for us give the kid a cowboy name that actually works with the surname Faulkner - a feat we had previously thought to be impossible. Emmett Faulkner does work. And you have to admit, it has a certain cowboy flavor to it. We sort of like cowboy names.

Robert Clement Watson is one of my favorite family figures, and well worth honoring. Mary has vetoed Robert as being too common, but we both sort of like the idea of the name Clement Watson Faulkner. So the question is this: is it possible for a boy/man to have the formal first name Clement without eventually being nicknamed Clem? Because where Emmett is a cowboy name that might work, Clem is certainly not. Clem Faulkner? No. And no thanks, even if it did work with Faulkner.

But Mary doesn't worry about it. We're both such active nicknamers, she reasons, that the odds of our not inventing some other permanent nickname for him, through the course of natural events, are virtually nil. Thus, the nickname Clem would be unlikely ever to get started and we need not worry about it.

So, friends, here is the question to you: is it possible to raise a Clement Watson Faulkner without simultaneously raising a "Clem"? Please do comment!

Day 114: It's a Boy

So we're having a boy, for anyone who doesn't know and does care.

We had suspended the naming debate 'til we could narrow the discussion. But neither of us have broached the subject of names since learning the kid's gender on Friday. I think Mary just doesn't want to face the discussion because she knows I have a strong preference for a particular name already, and she, while not necessarily objecting to the name, isn't crazy about it so far. I've cooled on "Elliott" (or "Eliot" or however it would be spelled). Now I like "Emmett" instead. Same idea, in many respects, with the punchy vowel beginning and the "t" sound at the end... but much cooler sounding than Eliot. Everett would be good too, along the same lines, but for family reasons we can't really use that.

Mary likes Dexter. One of the most prominent forebears on my father's side is Dexter Mason Ferry, who basically invented the commercial consumer market for seeds, in Detroit, in the late 19th century. (Mason is taken already - my god-son - or we might have considered using that name). Problem with Dexter is the 'er' sound in it. Dexter Faulkner doesn't roll of the tongue. We could get around it by using "Dex" as a nickname, which I like a lot, but putting Dex against Faulkner is problematic because it's two dipthongs in a row [Correction: dipthongs are consecutive vowel sounds, this is a triple consonant]. Hard to pronounce. The end of Dex and the beginning of Faulkner give you a weird ksf sound I don't like. Also "Dexter" is traditionally a wimp's name.

We'll figure it out. Maybe Mary will warm to the name Emmett. Or maybe I'll get over it. One scary thing is the speed with which we lose interest with names we had at some point liked. I get the idea that no matter where we settle, one year later we'll wish we had chosen something different.

Day 81: Name Game - Fake-out edition

Mary and I will soon be journeying to Idaho for a family reunion at her parents' house. Our news has made it's rounds out there, so everyone will know. The question will inevitably arise: so have you chosen any names yet?

For a boy: Eeyore. No, it's a very common English name, actually. Where do you think Milne got it?! That'll be keep 'em guessing!

For a girl: Flinger.

We may also try Fifi, which is great with Faulkner. Can't you just hear her answering the phone? "Fifi Faulkner, may I help you?"

I love watching people try to be polite when hearing something horrifying and ridiculous like this! Could be fun!