I am not sure if parents gave as much thought to the names of their children before the interweb.

When I was in school there were a few names and with very little in the way of originality – it was as if there was a book with 50 names and no one ever chose outside those names:

These were the ones I can say that made up the bulk of the kids who I was at school with {this is ignoring all the variations in spelling}:  Sharon, Tracy, Christopher, Beverley, Lisa, Lee-Anne, Shaun, Deidre, Clint/Clinton, Robert, Cindy, Jason, Tania, Craig – those are the ones where I knew at least three people with the same name.

Everyone had “normal” names, there was not one unusual name that I encountered throughout school – no Summer, Rainstorm, Blanket, Fifi Trixibelle, Spec Wildhorse and not one Moon Unit (these are all actual names of people).

I have always disliked my name – Celeste – I still really dislike it.

The main reason  that it is probably a less than ideal name for me is that I have a lisp.  Do you know how hard it is to say Celeste when you have a lisp?

It comes out  “Tha-leth-t” and pretty much as spit on the listeners top lip.  My spit on their lip.

This would usually require people to say “sorry, what was your name again?”

I would get more nervous and my lisp would be more pronounced.  To make matters all the more tragic, I could not pronounce “r” or “s” until I was in Sub B/Grade 2.

Eventually I would be too defeated to repeat my name, just started going “yes, close enough…” and then let them call me Nancy or what ever.

People sometimes pronounce the “e” at the end like Selesti …. I usually sigh and correct them, or if it is a telesales call I just put down the phone.  Trying to spell my name to someone telephonically – still – when I spell C – E – L – E …. I hear them repeat the L back to me as O …. yep Ceoeste would obviously be more right than Celeste.  Even when I say L like in LION —- they still write down “O” ….

On one occasion the person misheard me and called me “Chester” – so far that has been my favourite incorrect name.

I didn’t correct them – I wanted to be their ‘Chester.”

I sat my mother down one day and ask her what the hell came over her when she decided on Celeste.  Couldn’t I be Tracy, Sharon or Samantha????

She explained that I was meant to be “Claire” but as with anyone who tells anyone their almost-here baby’s name, someone is going to make fun of it and then this will make the parents dump it for something else.

It appears “Claire” and “eclair” sound similiar – and though my father was unable to make have many coherent thoughts, he felt that naming his child after a confectionery might be something he was not going to be overly glad about.  I actually never asked her what my name would have been if I was a boy.

It turns out my father’s mother’s best friend was Celeste.

Bear in mind that I was the first daughter of my parents.

My mom had two boys, and she was pretty sure that if her vagina presented her with a third boy she was going to wrap us all in a cheap carpet and dump us in a nearby river.  And then commit herself to the insane asylum.

She was pretty much done with penises in our house.  No more dicks were welcome.

My mom was 23 – young and stupid (her words, not mine) – and her mother in law was quite a “force” to be dealt with.

Then I was born, and my mother’s mother in law named me.

I am not really sure how much of this was because my mom thought it would be nice to give her mother in law (who also had three sons) the “honour” of naming a girl child – or just because my mom was pushed into a situation she could not back herself out of and my gran swanned it and took charge of this naming malarkey.

Either way I got to be named Celeste.

I was never a fan of my name, and am still not overly.  But it’s too late now to shift tracks now.

I had big dreams when I was 4 or 6 to have my name changed to Cinderella – I realised that my name would probably then be Cindy.

Again when you have a lisp that would be Thindy, so it was actually all pretty much a no hope situation – and really when you are at that point Celeste might not be so bad.

The top 5 names in 2013 according to http://www.babycentre.com are

1              Liam       Emma

2              Noah     Olivia

3              Ethan    Sophia

4              Mason  Ava

5              Jacob     Isabella

My sister in law is a teacher and she has some hysterical stories regarding children’s names in her class.  The one that stands out to me was a set of twins Dolce and Gabbana — real live twins.  She also had Giorgio and Armani in her class — she is a teacher in the UK – so she seriously has some horror stories that make you snort wine out your nose.

I was reasonably heavily pregnant with Isabelle, when someone said to me “Is a bell really necessary on a bicycle?” (Isabelle really necessary on a bicycle…) I hadn’t heard that one before – and it did make me pause for thought.

I used to come across the name Faghme – and I used to make the guttaral “ggg” sound, but then I was corrected and it actually is a less guttaral sound, and the “gh” is closer to a “k” sound – so that would result in me sitting at a production meeting asking “How is FUCK-me’s job doing …..”

I have encountered women called : Nomatter, Paymore, Behaviour and Buriel this month.

How did you get your name?

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