What's in a Name?

"What's in a name? That which we call a rose, by any other name would smell as sweet."
                                     -spoken by Juliet, in Romeo and Juliet, Wm. Shakespeare

In childhood, I hated my name.  Nobody else had it, and I carried the burden of being an original grudgingly.   For one thing, those who didn't already know me would actually stumble over how to pronounce, 'Paige.'  "Peg-gy?"  This from a girl who was a year older, and should have known how to sound out words. 


In the fourth grade, my language arts teacher assigned us a project to research the origin of our names.  We were to find out where our names came from and why our parents had picked them.  To my horror, none of the standard sort of baby names books even had "Paige."  And I had no middle name, no shot at redemption.  My best friend at the time, added to my misery by finding out easily that her first name, "Sarah," means 'princess' and her middle name, "Ann" means 'grace.' 
I asked Dad, "How did you pick my name?"  And he let me down by answering readily that it was just something that Mom had had in mind.  So no romantic story there.  Two towns down the road at a much bigger library, a dusty book on a bottom shelf had my name in its lists: Paige - from Middle French, page; from Latin, child servant.  I cried in secret, because I had been named a slave.  The name of a person seemed to me to be just as prophetic as the title of a book, already resolved from beginning to end, and I did not want my name to be my story. 

In fifth grade, Mr. Marano called me, "Chapter."  That was alright, actually, because I could tell that he liked me.  It was some sort of zany salute on his part.  One day I scored a fantastic kick in a kickball game, and he made a crack about promoting me to "Book."  I let that moniker go, but the years of "Hey, Paige, what page are  you on?" and "Turn the page, Paige!" had left me a bit brittle.

Choosing names for our children was a matter of great moment to me.  Jeffrey and I had no trouble agreeing on first names, and it was he who suggested that we pick middle names, as well, to offset the common 'Smith' at the end.  I wanted names that were a bit romantic, a bit old-fashioned, and pleasurable to say in their entirety.  They must be names I enjoyed saying, so that my children might hear love in a personalized summons.  Also, I disdained any nick-naming, right from the first.  No turning Victoria into Vicky, or Elizabeth into something else. 
'Hannah Scarlett' came first. 'Hannah' is the Hebrew for "grace," from which all forms of 'Ann' derive.  Next, we had 'Emma Catherine.'  I must admit that we fell into the nickname trap in her case, calling her 'Emma Cate' almost from the first.  It was instinctive, and maybe because she was such a rounded-off  little ball, where her sister had been all long and skinny.  'Owen Wyatt' followed.  My husband and I had been watching movies about Wyatt Earp and Doc Holiday.  'Ella Rose' came in among us, truly like a pink rosebud, and her naming was my tribute to the beloved grandmother I had lost before Owen was two weeks old.  Grandma had always talked to me of her mother, Ruth Ella.  'Landon James' occured to me, and it needed some time for my husband to get used to the idea.  But I won, since I was having to do all the work of carrying and birthing him, not to mention keeping him entertained all night every night for a year.  Then we went to the hospital to have number six, and I had only a girl's name prepared.  So you know what happened next. 

"What will we call him, honey?"  I asked him with real concern; we have already established that naming is meaningful for me.  Thankfully, within twenty minutes we had come up with 'Jonathan' - the gift of God, and 'Daniel' - beloved of God.  I meant for this child to be the last, being done with the exhaustion of pregnancies and their toll.  His name satisfied my husband's simple requirements, with the bonus of matching his own initials.  For me, the sentimentalist, and the one who likes to ponder things all inside out, naming Jonathan was a way of summing up all the children.  When I say his name, I am reminded that God loves my sons and daughters, that I love them too, and that I have found my life in serving God by serving my children.

My name is Paige.