WHAT’S IN A NAME?

Gerry Moohr, a.k.a., Geraldine Louise Szott Moohr (Sherman)

            Geraldine. Chosen by my mother, whose melodic name was Eleanor. She reportedly could not decide between Geraldine and Stephanie, seemingly bound to give me a boy’s nickname. Geraldine was not then an unusual name; I went through twelve years of Catholic school with Geraldine Fitzgerald and another Geraldine whose surname I’ve forgotten. There were also two Geralds. Five Gerry’s out of a class of ninety-two.

            Gerry. My nickname. No, my name. No one ever has ever called me Geraldine. Even the nuns accepted Gerry, maybe because of its Irish roots. Like the diminutive of Gerald, it begins with a “G” and ends with “Y.” In eighth grade, I experimented and wrote “Geri” on an assignment. Sister Benedict held my paper high so all could see, reading aloud: “G. E. R. I.” She paused, and said, “How odd, there is no one here with this name.” I watched her toss my paper into the wastebasket.

            Gigi. My personal favorite, only for family. No one—not one—of my four younger brothers could pronounce Gerry, and I became Gigi. They are now middle-aged, but Gigi sometime slips out. Their children all resorted to Gigi, as do the nine-year old twins of the next generation. A comforting continuity.

            Louise. My middle name, rarely used though official. Mom never told me why she chose it, and I’ve encountered only one “Louise,” a babysitter who clearly favored my brothers.

            Szott. My father’s family name, passed first to Mom, then to five children. Given to Dad by his parents, who immigrated from Poland in the early 1900s. John and Anna Szott settled in Saginaw, Michigan, raised thirteen children who all lived long lives. John rose to become an elite member of the working class, responsible for the blast furnace at a General Motors foundry. My father began at GM as a draftsman and retired as a senior manager.

            Szott may look and sound strange, but the “Sz” combination was not uncommon where I grew up, surrounded by Szymanskis and Szilogys, names of grandparents from faraway Poland, Ukraine, Lithuania. So many people, so much courage. When our names are typed in Word, the dreaded red line appears. Unrecognized.

            Moohr. I took his name when I married, without any thought at all. At the time, in my town, my church, my family, it was the natural consequence of marriage. “Moohr” also offends Word and must be spelled at least twice to strangers. I slowly repeat “M. O. O. H. R.” and brush aside questions with a breezy, ‘No, I don’t know were it came from.” No point telling strangers the history of an ex-husband’s parents. I embraced “Ms.,” ditched “Mrs.” right away. But yes, I still use his name. Why, after the long marriage ended, did I keep it? Because I wasn’t going to make leaving easy for him. Because I wanted to deny the other woman the pleasure of being the only Mrs. Moohr.

            (Sherman). My beloved’s last name. No sacramental marriage this time; a Unitarian minister, a woman, kindly obliged. It’s in parenthesis because I never use it. He would have like me to, but I ended discussion before it began with an edgy tease. “Men only get to give their names to one woman and you’ve already done that.” I meant what I said, but harbored a second reason, a deference to his sons, bound to their mother, the first Mrs. Sherman. He didn’t seem to mind, seemed glad just to have me. I felt the same way about him. Now that he’s dead, I wonder if I was too hasty.

*

            So: what’s in a name? We acquire them at our beginnings and accumulate more as life sends us in new directions. I carry these markers; daughter, sister, student, descendant of Polish immigrants, aunt, wife, ex-wife, wife again, widow. The names and the markers are mere starting points.

            It would be better just to tell stories.