What's In A Name?

Getting married is, like, way more than flowers and cake flavors and colors. I mean, yeah, aesthetics are nice, but I'm way more worried about the important things like changing my name.

When I was a little girl, I simply assumed that I would take my husband's surname. Cinderella did it. Or maybe not? I mean, the story ends kind of abruptly. That whole marriage and name changing is implied, but still, you get the point.

It wasn't until high school when I started publishing articles and editorials nationwide that I realized the value of my name. Writing is all about branding. People associate names with genres, likeability (is that even a word?), etc. For instance I hear James Patterson and immediately "suspense, thriller" pops into my mind. Kathleen E. Woodiwiss equals sweeping historical romance while Khaled Hosseini or Gabriel Garcia Marquez make me think of literary masterpieces.

Being that I write literary and YA fiction with a Latina bent, my last name is kind of important. I considered keeping Maria L. Hernandez as my career name and taking Overstreet as my legal name. In fact, I had all but settled on that until I started doing pretend introductions in front of the mirror a few mornings before the wedding. That's when I realized that Maria L. Overstreet sounds weird. And no, not in that "Oh! That's different" way. More like, "WTF?"

It suddenly dawned on me that I wasn't just replacing an interchangeable name with a different one. I was replacing my identity. All of my life I've identified as a Latina. Am I really 100% Latina? No, not really. I have a Hispanic father and a Caucasian mother, but I was raised primarily in the Mexican American culture. I'm a roasted corn and pan dulce munching, pinata smacking, mariachi listening girl and Hernandez is a part of that.

Now I have to say that Dave has never once pressured me into taking his name. He's just, like, whatever makes you happy. That said I finally settled on Hernandez-Overstreet. Obviously our kids will go by Overstreet only b/c seriously, I'm not mean enough to slam my kindergartner with a 19 letter last name. That's just cruel.

So that's that. Oh, and just for your amusement here's a snippet of Dave's interaction with the saleswoman at Men's Warehouse.

Dave: I wanted to let you know up front that I couldn't find my tie.

Her in a helfpul tone: Well did you ask the other guys if they found an extra one?

Dave: Um...they weren't there when I got undressed.

Her: Oh.