Team M-E-A-T: February 2007

Jennifer's post on names dredged up this memory for me.

When we moved into our first house, we were newlyweds of 1-1/2 years. The house wasn't much to look at, a simple 1000 square foot ranch on a decent sized lot. But it was ours, and we were happy to have it.

Over the 5 years we lived there, we were friendly with our neighbors to the south. Craig and Hildy were about our age, newlyweds as well, living in their equally-quaint starter home. We had many talks over the fence, we celebrated when they gave birth to their daughter Samantha, we held them in high regard.

When Samantha was around 18 months old, Hildy was pregnant again. At the time, Abby was just a few months old. We rejoiced for Craig and Hildy again. Soon after she became pregnant, Craig and Hildy decided that they would put their house for sale and move into a bigger home. We were sad that our neighbors would be moving, but knew we wouldn't be too far behind.

One day in April, Hildy came over to borrow a hairdryer. I asked her how the pregnancy was going, and she filled me in on how she was looking forward to the end of the summer when her baby was due. I asked if they knew the sex, and she told me that Samantha would have a little brother. They were excited to have a girl and a boy. We wrapped up the conversation, and Hildy left.

Ethan was born a month later. We hadn't really told anyone outside of our family about the possibility that we would be parents again in May, so it was a surprise to Craig and Hildy when we suddenly had a baby. One day, Mark saw that they were in the backyard and went outside to share the good news with them, we had a little boy and named him Ethan.

For the next couple weeks, Hildy avoided us. If we went out when she was out, she would immediately go inside. We thought it was strange, but had no idea what was going on so we dismissed it. Until one Friday afternoon in the middle of the summer.

I was loading the kids into the car to pick Mark up for a trip out of town. Hildy stormed out of the house.

"How could you do that, Trista??" she asked.

I was stunned, and asked what she was talking about.

"I never thought you would steal my name! You knew I was going to name this baby Ethan. I told you."

But the reality was, she hadn't told me. She said that she must have mentioned it when she came over to borrow the hair dryer. I know for a fact that she didn't mention it. Wouldn't I remember a thing like that - my neighbor telling me that her son would be Ethan while I was waiting for our own Ethan to be born?

No amount of my convincing changed her mind. I explained that we had chosen the name over a year before, before Abby was born. She was so sure that we had stolen her name, because nobody has even heard of Ethan, she said. I bit my tongue so that I wouldn't ask her what planet she was living on, since I know several Ethans. I tried to apologize(??) for the misunderstanding, but reassured her that I didn't intentionally take the same name she was going to use. She told me that it was a good thing that they were moving, or she would have to choose a different name. I bit my tongue so I wouldn't ask her what was wrong with her that she couldn't have a child with the same name as the neighbor - it's not like I'm her sister or anything! After 20 minutes of trying to reason with Hildy, I had to go tend to my screaming Ethan in the car and really had to pick Mark up to go out of town. She apprehensively told me that she believed me.

Hildy never spoke to me again. Craig confided in Mark that she was still upset about the name thing, even though it didn't really bother him. They moved away at the end of the summer. They didn't even say goodbye.

All of this over a name (which happened to rank #5 for boy names in 2004). It's really quite sad, don't you think?