CAROLYN GRANT
Someone in the United States has named their new baby girl 'Younique'. Younique. That's.... not an ordinary name. One might say it's.... no, I won't even say it because it would be indulging such foolishness.
A baby boy has been named Carrion. Even in the somewhat red-neck (at times) East Kootenay, naming your child after road kill is just not done.
Oh, there is also a Dolton. I just... why, parents? Why? Do you want your child to fail before he or she even has a chance? We all picture our children as successes, so as you sit dreaming with your little bundle of joy, what makes you think that anyone named Dolton will be elected to well... anything?
There is a website out there called Nameberry, which has all the name information you need. They recently compiled a list of what they say are the worst baby names ever, and there were some doozies. Take Ahmiracle and Dmiracle. There were also variations of this miracle theme in the even more popular Lamiracle and Jamiracle. So yes, a newborn baby is "a miracle" but do you inflict that name on your kid? Apparently you do.
Adding a letter to slightly change the spelling has been popular in recent years. It makes your child stand out, it's something 'younique', if you will. For instance the name Asia has been popular, but this year more than one pair of outstanding parents decided to go one step further and name their child Assia. Yup, that's not open for teasing at all. There was also an Abass.
Other parents chose Disney — maybe hoping for a free trip to the Magic Kingdom. Still others chose Ikea — perhaps hoping for a free Kvarglit with matching prjnis.
Naming children after the weather — Sunny, Winter etc. is not without precedent, but Shady?
There have also been a baker's dozen of Vaders in recent years. I have no explanation for that.
Although there may be even worse names out there, those don't get registered unless at least five babies in the country were given these names. So all of the above names have been chosen by at least five sets of parents in the United States.
I understand the desire to be younique. You want your child to stand out. And it's very true that certain decades tend to produce an absolute flurry of babies with the same names. The '80s were filled with Jasons and Jennifers. Followed by the Morgans, Tiffanys, and more of the '90s. In 2012, it was Sophia and Jacob, followed by Emma and Mason. All popular. Maybe too popular for parents searching for the younique.
But Whizdom? Vegas? Kal-el?
Stop and think, people.
Nameberry has also compiled a list of names they think are going to be very trendy in the coming decade – the Jasons of 2020s and beyond.
Included in this list are Clover and Calla (not bad at all really), Zephyr (a tad pretentious, but I'll grudgingly accept it), Lux (I'm not sure), Waverly (predicted to be the cool girl's name), Nero (doesn't bring up the greatest memory – fat guy fiddling while Rome burns, but to each his own, I guess), Breccan (a short leap from the currently popular Declan), Tiberius (another emperor, but also a Harry Potter character), Balthazar (what do you shorten this to on the ball field? Balthy? Zar?)
In any event, according to Nameberry, in the next five years or so, there will be plenty of little Clovers, Luxes, Neros and Balthazars running around.
At the very least I hope they outnumber the Whizdoms, Carrions and Youniques.
Carolyn Grant is Editor of the Kimberley Daily Bulletin