What ever happened to Jane?

Parents have lost their minds and proper spelling has become unfashionable. How are these two things related, you ask? Take a look at what people are naming their kids these days. It's appalling, and frankly, I think some of it borders on child abuse.

My husband and I are both first born perfectionists, so when it came to naming our children, we approached the task methodically and with a certain set of rules. First, no names that could be shortened or bastardized into something else. No Benjamin shortened to Ben, no Samantha shortened to Sam. Second, no gender neutral names that would have people guessing. Third, something that was easy to spell, given our somewhat cumbersome/ethnically rare last name. We also wanted our children's names to be a reflection of our heritage, Irish in my case, Ukrainian in my husbands. And, being somewhat traditional, we wanted to give our children classic names that would wear well with time. Cutesy boy names don't work so well on a 55 year old man, and I'm sorry, but a woman named Candy is very hard to take seriously.

While going through this exercise, we referenced many sources, from family trees to baby books. We also checked out current naming trends. Our provincial government puts out an annual list of all the baby names in a given year. Honestly, if I hadn't been pregnant, I would have gone through the list with a glass of wine in my hand. Can't decide if it's a comedy, a horror story or a Greek tragedy.

Personally, I'd spell Hailey like this: HAILEY. 154 sets of parents in Alberta last year agreed with me. However, apparently this isn't good enough for a bunch of people out there. In 2007, the variations of Hailey include: Hailee (12), Hailei (1), Haileigh (1) , Haili (1), Hailie (1), Haily (2), Haleigh (4), Haley (34) , Hali (1), Halie (2), Haylea (1), Haylee (11), Hayleigh (3), Hayley (43), and Haylie (9). So, if my math is correct, 126 sets of parents weren't satisfied with the generally accepted way of spelling Hailey. Frankly, all these different spellings look like a mess of alphabet soup.

Even a fairly unmessable name like Elizabeth gets butchered. How about Elisabeth, Elizabith, Elizebeth, Elysabeth, and my personal favourite, Elyzabeth.

The boys don't fare much better. Last time I checked, this was the correct way to spell Michael. 109 sets of parents agreed with me. However, 18 think that Micheal is the way to go. I'm sorry, but I see that and it just makes me think that there are 36 people out there that don't know how to spell their kid's name. How about Joseph. Three sets of parents thought it is spelt Joeseph or Joesph. Butchery.

Another lovely classic boys name that gets butchered is Alexander. 205 couples got it right in 2007. However, the following just make me shake my head: Aleksandar (4), Aleksander (1), Aleksandr (1), Alexandar (1), Alexxander (1), Alexzander (1), and Alex-Zander (1). Ten little boys out there are going to spend the rest of their lives having their name misspelled. And, after all their parent's efforts to give them an original looking name, will likely just end up shortening it to Alex just to avoid the hassles.

Now, I understand that naming your children is a very personal matter, and I have no real issues with some amount of originality creeping in, atrocious spelling aside. However, there are some names that should never be allowed. Seriously, I wouldn't be too put off by a group of naming police vetoing certain names. For example, any name that consists only of initials. In my world, AJ and PR are NOT legitimate names for a child. They can be initials, but not a full name in and of themselves. If you don't believe somebody named their kid PR, check out the boys names for 2003. That kid will be scarred for life.

How about this for a boys name: Bane. If the parents had only looked this word up in the dictionary, they would have realized that it means: a person or thing that ruins or spoils, a deadly poison, death, destruction, ruin, that which causes death or destroys life. Nice. Can't even comment on that.

Cowboy, Copper, Corny, Davidgregory, Daxz, E, Furious, Gauge, Gix, Gleb, Iazzc, Jaxxon, M, Midnite, Maxxamillion, Obsidian-Angel, S, Xxavier and Xzavion were all boys names in 2007. Seriously. And for girls? How about B'Elanna, Butterfly, Carisma, Chaos, Coltanna, Dexter, Elliexiah, Emma-Star-Ulaniq, Ever, Jazzmyn, Juniper, Mersaideze, Tea, Wes-Leigh, Unique and Vintage.

If I was an elementary school teacher, I'd dread the beginning of every school year.