Baby names

This is the story of the very stupid reason why we couldn't name my second child what I wanted to name her.

We agreed very quickly on a name for our first child. When it came to the second, I wanted her name to start with the letter L, because my grandmother's name is Louise and we promised to name one child after her. But Louise is really old-fashioned, so I suggested the name Lauren. My husband liked the name, so we were set: Lauren.

End of story, right?

So there was this guy I was very good friends with in high school and college named Joseph. Joe was actually one of my very best friends. We never hooked up or anything--we were just friends, I swear. Anyway, Joe was a huge math nerd, and during the summers in high school, he went to this math camp where he was apparently a huge Casanova. It's sort of like being Superman. When you're in the real world, you're ordinary or even a nerd, but then you go to math camp and suddenly you're the only guy who's heard of a shower and doesn't have facial hair in weird places. So yes, Joe managed to get some math camp action in the form of two girlfriends during his two summers there.

And very coincidentally, the name of one of Joe's girlfriends was the name of our first daughter. And the name of his other girlfriend was Lauren.

And even more coincidentally, my first daughter's middle name is Josephine. Can I help it if my grandfather's name was also Joseph and I'd promised my mother for ages to use that name?

Anyway, my husband didn't know any of this stuff, and I actually didn't even realize it myself. But one day, it did occur to me and I said it to my husband, like as something that was pretty funny. And you know what? After that, he refused to name the baby Lauren!

I thought that was a little over the top. I mean, how could we not choose a name we both like for our kid based on the math camp girlfriends of some guy that I hardly ever talked to anymore?

We did eventually pick another name we both liked, although I'm still a little nostalgic for Lauren. I was chatting with Joe online recently and I told him the whole story, and he said he was totally shocked my husband wouldn't use the name based on that. Although he admitted his wife (who I also went to school with) probably would have noticed and commented on it if I used that name.