What ever happened to simple names? You know, like Michael for guys and Christine for girls.
I’ve been stuck with an odd last name all my life. The name Aun has caused me so much grief over the years. I recall showing up for school when I was just six years old and the teacher called the role. She repeatedly called for Ann Michael and no one answered, including yours truly.
Content that Ann missed her first day of school, she moved right along. “Did I miss anyone?” she asked at the conclusion of her list. I politely raised my hand and identified that I was Michael Aun. Realizing her error, she chuckled and moved along, but I had to put up with being called “Ann” by my buddies for my entire first year of school.
Aun is not the correct spelling of my last name. It should actually be spelled Aoun, but the folks at immigration in Ellis Island decided (as they did for so many) to make life easy for my paternal grandfather George Aoun. Others Aoun families had their names spelled Awn, and I even have long lost cousins in New Orleans that spell theirs Owen.
My maternal grandfather’s name was Elias Skaff. When he arrived at Ellis Island, the immigration folks said to him, “Look Mac, you need to change that last name if you’re going to fit in here.” His response was simple: “Fine, I’ll take Mack.” He kept his first name and used Skaff as his middle name- Elias Skaff Mack.
He and his son Elias S. Mack, Jr. were both elected Mayor of the town of Lexington, SC exactly forty years apart. Shortly after my grandfather was elected, it was determined that he was an illegal alien. Apparently some of the paperwork got screwed up, so he called on his old buddy, then Governor Strom Thurmond to get him correctly nationalized.
You can do very little about your last name, but I have to wonder aloud why some parents literally make the lives of their children so difficult by giving their kids such odd first names that I can’t pronounce or spell.
As the play-by-play announcer for Harmony Pop Warner football in Harmony, Florida, I get the honor and privilege of calling six football games per day every Saturday. Each team has a minimum of 30-50 kids in uniform. In addition, each team has a cheer squad, some of which have as many as fifty little girls on the sidelines. That’s an average of 80 or so names I get to call for each team that takes the field. Two teams play so now we’re up to 130-160 names I need to know for each game. Since there are six games…. well, you do the math, I’m looking at 700-1000 names per week.
It takes me almost ten minutes to get through the pre-game announcement list. And God help you if you miss one. Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin joked in her speech at the Republican National Convention recently, “You know the difference between a hockey mom and a pit bull? Lip stick.” Trust me, Sarah ain’t that far off.
I have never seen the anger of a mom pounding on the door of our press box demanding that I announce the entire roster again and include her daughter this time around.
However, that isn’t my biggest problem. I rarely omit anyone unless they were omitted from the original list, but folks, I have to tell you, some of these names today’s parents give their kids are some real challenges. Why would you name you daughter such names as Shi, Essence, Muscrat, Kameshiegh or Dance? These are some of the monikers I have to navigate around every Saturday.
One father made the trip up to the press box to inform me that if I called his son Areilieus Kong, his given name, I’d have to answer to him. “But Mr. Kong, that’s the name on the roster,” I responded. “You can call him ‘King’.”
Are you kidding me- “King Kong”? My eternal sympathies are with this child and any other that has to suffer a lifetime consequences associated with this. “What’s in a name?” Trust me… more than I want to admit.
