My not-so-well-kept secret

I’m royally ticked-off with Brangelina.

I have slacked on watching E! like I used to with the New York girls, but I happened to catch a headline about the new twins who were born to Brad and Angie over the weekend.

I also caught their names, and to my horror I found that they named their daughter “Vivienne Marcheline”. “Marcheline” I’m not partial to, but Vivienne… I love(d) that name. When I have kids in 50 some-odd years, I wanted to name one Vivienne. WANTED being the operative word here.

I started having a thing for the name Vivienne when I went to the Met a few years ago and walked through a Vivienne Westwood exhibit. “What a great name: Vivienne Westwood,” I thought to myself, as I made a mental note of it. I’ve always loved really classic names and Vivienne has never been overused. Until now, that is.

Everyone, okay maybe every girl, has names they like for babies, and we’re all very protective of our favorites. You think I’m joking? Some of my friends who have sisters have even “called” names and agreed upon which sister gets which names so that there won’t be any disputes on down the line when both of them discover they wanted to name their daughter Suri Cruz II, or what have you. The naming of spawn is serious business, I tell you.

Remember what happened after the episode of ‘Friends’ where Rachel named her baby “Emma”? Before that episode, that name wasn’t even on the radar. It was still sitting gracefully on the cover of one of my favorite Jane Austen novels. Then it exploded.

Since Baby Emma on “Friends”, you can’t attend the birthday party of anyone under the age of six without running into at least 3-17 little girls named “Emma”. It’s been on the top 10 list of girl names for several years running now.

Maybe Vivienne won’t catch on like Emma did. Maybe she’ll just get lost in the litter of Brangelina children and all hope will not be lost.

Or maybe I’ll have four boys and I will get to learn once again that God has a great sense of humor.

“Of all the rights of women, the greatest is to be a mother.”
-Lin Yutang