Example: I grew up in a home where I was the only individual with my surname. My mother, step-father, and brother all had a different name. And the only way I can remember ever being bothered by this was that other people worried so much about how my last name impacted me. Which it didn't -- aforementioned crock.
It did not present legal problems. It did not present problems at school. No one ever freaked out or fatally misunderstood my mother when she said, "No, I'm not Mrs. Amy's-last-name; she has her father's surname."
It's a bigger deal to me that my mother had to give up naming her daughter what she wanted than that I have my father's last name, because guess what? Once you live with it for over 24 years, it's not your father's last name anymore. If you want it to be, it's just your name. I'm only sorry for her that she missed an opportunity to pass down a name she loved. I don't plan on making that same sacrifice.
I like my last name. The key word in that sentence is not "like" but "my." My last name. Mine mine mine. If I was just picking a last name out of the clear blue sky, maybe I'd pick something different. "Wilder." "Dresden." "Bewilderforce." Who knows? But right now, my surname, L., works just fine, thank you.
Now, I'm not going to be negative about FH's surname, because it's fine for him and he's had it for over 29 years, so there's clearly no need to trash it. In some ways, it's good that he doesn't want to change his name; it lets him relate to how little interest I have in changing my last name. Because, while there is a certain novelty to the idea of changing my surname to "Bewilderforce," there's absolutely no appeal in turning into "Mrs. FH." The honorific Mrs., when picturing it applied to me, makes me gag.
It stands in for "mistress." I'm nobody's mistress.
Obviously, this is a personal decision, as it damn well should be. Far be it from me to criticize the feelings of a woman who really wants to change her name, or who just doesn't give a rat's ass and is picking other battles. Fine. Run along, be empowered. You have my full support.
My personal feeling, for my circumstances, is best summed up by Meg:
I have been near blindsided by how angry I still feel over this choice. When mail comes addressed to me as Mrs. Meg His, I ask David to take the label off before I get home, so I don't have to see it. When someone addresses me as Mrs.** I literally get shaky with rage. And I didn't expect that response! What is that response? I mean, my mother is a first wave feminist, for gods sake, and she uses Mrs.! Why am I so so angry about it?
And then this weekend I figured it out on a real tangible level. We were having a long conversation with a lesbian couple who are good friends of ours, and the name change discussion came up. After we'd cycled through talking about all the different choices (combining names, hyphenating names, picking a new name, picking one persons name... etc, etc) they started talking about how they didn't really have any idea about what they were going to do about their kids names (or their names after they had kids, even) and they'd figure it out somehow. And then I fully, fully emotionally realized why I was getting shaky angry, I realized why readers were writing me, literally in tears and rage at the same time (readers who want to take there husbands name write me like this, the same way people who don't want to take their husbands name write me like this). It's because we're used to a level playing field, and on this we don't have one. It's not anyone's fault really, but thems the breaks.
This is what I had to come to terms with: That I would continue to feel anger past the point of making the decision (which wasn't even a decision, as I never even considered changing my name) and making it known. My decision will continue to be indicative of an uneven playing field.
Let's be honest: That sucks.
Some time ago, when I was in the darkest depths of teenagedom, I wrote an autobiographical poem. I don't remember the poem and I no longer have a copy of it, but I do recall the final sentence: "Be careful with my name." Certainly nothing else I wrote during teenage hell was so prescient.
