What's in a Name?

When I was a senior in high school, I was a TA for an AP Art History class.  Toward the end of the year, the class got to go on a field trip to San Francisco to see the art at the Palace of Legion of Honor.  My mom came along as a chaperone and, if I'm being honest, the two of us spent the day having way too much fun and not nearly enough time chaperoning. 

On the bus ride back from the trip, we spent a good long while considering my future children's names.  I've still got the notebook outlining the selections for boys and girls.  I remember that day thinking to myself, I like so many boy names.  I better have a bunch of boys, because I don't like any girl names. 

Well, past-self, to you I say: HA.  It is NOT easy to name your boy.  A name is a BIG decision.  We are talking about a human being.  I'm determining the nicknames he'll have, the taunts that bullies may come up with, the name that future college and job recruiters will read and judge him on, whether he'll spend his life spelling his name for people instead of just telling them his name, or whether he'll be able to write his name at a young age or not (if it has hard letters in it).  This is a lot to consider. 

Is seems that every little boy I know who was born in the last 18 months has a name that starts with C or K, so we won't be going that direction. 

I, personally, have 6 [current] favorite names (notice the voting widget to your right?).  Geoff likes them all just fine.  He wishes that Xavier was on the list and that Jackson was spelled Jaxon...but these are two things I cannot allow (not for any GOOD reason, mind you.  I just don't care for them for my kid). 

So, anyway.  I started looking into the meanings of these names - and they nearly all are sub-par.  I mean, Amanda means "worthy of love."  Geoffrey means "God peace."  These are pretty alright meanings.  Can my little boys name really mean "Son of Jack?"  That's not even accurate. 

So here's the meanings of my top boy names.  If I choose one of the "lamer" meanings...maybe I'll just have to make up my own meaning for it. Ha!

Elijah - The Lord is my God; Jackson - Son of Jack; Jakob: Supplanter; Lincoln - From the Lake Settlement; Logan - From the Hollow; Lukas: From Lucania.  See?  Not all that impressive overall.  Probably because most of the names were originally surnames. 

Anyway, I like them all and I don't think we could go particularly wrong with any of them.  But...deciding is the worst. 

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