What's in a name?

There's the easy question, "Will you marry me?" Answer: OF COURSE!  Then there's the difficult question, "Will you change your name?" Answer: Umm... (cue inner dialog) Women have fought for decades so that they could get out of the house, go to college instead of finishing school, follow any career of their choice, and we still have to conform the the convention of the name....

I think the fact that it's a question recognizes the huge strides women have made.  That it's a choice women have and not an expectation.  There are so many inspiring and creative options where women are deciding to keep their maiden name, hyphen the two names, move the maiden name to a middle name and take the last name, make up a combination or new name, and just take his last name.  Regardless of the decision.  It's a decision, and it's a conversation worth having with your partner.

It is a struggle though. I struggled with my identity. I've grown up in a family (including my mother) that takes immense pride in our last name. My brothers and I all go by our last name in certain circles of friends.  It's symbolic of our origin and ethnicity.  There's a clan of us that have a strong common bond in our name.  For 26 years I've been called one name and now in one day it changes.  That's a lot to take in.  Not to mention I can't connect the cursive 'C' to the 'T' the way I can connect the cursive 'C' to the 'A' in my current signature.  Plus my new initials are CAT. Cute? Lame? I don't know?

Then I started reflecting on the women in my life and how they were connected to me, and they all have different last names.  Does that make us less connected?  Not at all.  It makes us more.  It gives me women as role models who made the choice (or didn't have the choice) to keep, drop, take, hyphen, or shift all their names.  It expands our identity to include people from all over the world. What an empowering feeling! And that's what women fought for, empowerment and the ability to choose their destination.

So I guess Juliet knew what she was talking about when she told Romeo:

"What's in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet."

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When you register for Guest Bliss, you'll get a personal message from Jeremy and me, where you can see what I chose to do about my name.