{"id":5831,"date":"2012-01-25T11:21:00","date_gmt":"2012-01-25T15:21:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/2012\/01\/25\/baby-boy-detwiler-issues-of-twilight-and-beer\/"},"modified":"2014-06-19T13:27:42","modified_gmt":"2014-06-19T17:27:42","slug":"baby-boy-detwiler-issues-of-twilight-and-beer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.swistle.com\/babynames\/2012\/01\/25\/baby-boy-detwiler-issues-of-twilight-and-beer\/","title":{"rendered":"Baby Boy Detwiler: Issues of Twilight and Beer"},"content":{"rendered":"

Katie writes:<\/p>\n

I am a longtime reader and thought I would be more than prepared for my own baby name experience once it arrived. Well, here it is… I am due on March 30th with a baby boy and i am anything BUT well prepared! I have 3 different issues going on; not wanting a top ten name, Twilight, and initials I don’t know if I can use. To give you some background, my name is Katie, my husband’s name is Jon, and our last name is Detwiler. I grew up in Amish Country, and we have an Amish sounding last name, so that’s a factor for me as well, so I guess that’s a fourth issue for me! I would like to avoid some of the typical Amish names. Jon has given me 2 top five lists, “Unusual Names” (that I don’t think are actually that unusual) and “Normal Names.”<\/p>\n

Unusual Names:<\/p>\n

Aksel
\nSoren
\nMaximus
\nZander
\nRiddick<\/p>\n

Normal Names:<\/p>\n

Jakeb (yes, that’s with an -eb at the end… Not going to happen)
\nMason
\nEvan
\nZeke
\nFinn<\/p>\n

I seem to be having some mental block and can’t even think of any names I think I like or are right for this poor little man, so we settled on Jakob Soren or Maximus Grey as our top two finalists.<\/p>\n

These two finalists have produced all 4 of my issues. Jakob\/Jacob is Jon’s #1 name out of all 10… It has been in the top five names for what seems like a hundred years, it’s Amish, and my sister in law is due a month before me and their girl name is Bella. Really. Maximus Grey gives us the initials MGD. I think we might have been ok a few years ago with these initials but then out came MGD 64… Does that even matter?<\/p>\n

So I need to know if I should just get over any of these issues, or if you think any of them are actually legit. My pick is definitely Max, but those initials are bothering me. Also, if we were having a girl, we both like Ellie, but Jon preferred Eleanor and I preferred Eloise for her full name.<\/p>\n

If you take a look at our style and have any new name suggestions as well, we’re still definitely open to a change! Thank you!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 
\nI had to Google MGD 64 to see what the issue was. But I’m not a beer-drinker; if you were considering the name Smirnoff or even GNT I would have known what was what. And Jacob Detwiler wouldn’t have made me think Amish.<\/p>\n

But I think it can be tempting to dismiss anything as silly if it’s not a familiar association: I haven’t seen Titanic so Jack and Rose seems like a dismissible thing to worry about—but ask me about siblings Max and Ruby and I’m completely opposed: the associations I recognize seem shocking, while the associations someone ELSE recognizes seem barely worth considering—only because they’re not important TO ME, which is not the question when we’re talking about the societal impact of a name. With the polls I always want to separate out the opinions of the people who HAVE the association from the people who don’t. Let’s have a poll over to the right and see if we can do that even though it makes the response options kind of LONG.<\/p>\n

It seems too that the MGD issue would be a simple problem to fix, unless you’re totally set on Grey as the only middle name you want to consider. Even if you think the initials are a deal-breaker, that doesn’t rule out the name Max.<\/p>\n

While I might not name siblings Edward and Bella, I don’t see a problem with Jacob and Bella for cousins. The name Bella is fairly strongly associated with Twilight (though all the Bellas, as well as all the Isabellas going by Bella, help to reduce that), but Jacob is common enough to have an even more diluted set of associations. And Bella and Jacob don’t end up together romantically, right? So it’s not a connection that would bother me. But again, we have the personal associations factoring in: I skimmed the first Twilight book and that’s it, so of course the association would seem insignificant to me. What we want is SOCIETY’S reaction. Let’s have a second poll over to the right about this issue.<\/p>\n

Between Jacob and Maximum, my own favorite is Jacob. Jacob Detwiler seems like a nice boy, and handsome. And J.D. makes a cute initial nickname, if you want it.<\/p>\n

From the entire list, my favorite is Soren Jacob. It lets your husband have his favorite name but without the Jacob\/Bella issue, the Top Ten issue, or the Amish Name issue.<\/p>\n

We recently discussed Maxon\/Maxton<\/a>, if you’d want to consider a different long form for Max.<\/p>\n

Because you have Zander and Zeke, I wonder if you would like Xavier?<\/p>\n

Evan from your list makes me think of Ian. But it gives the initials I.D., if you want to avoid that. (A D-surname sure is hard to work with for those of us who prefer not to spell anything with initials! 2012 A.D., CD, double-D, ED, fire dept, g-d, high definition, show your I.D., M.D., O.D., police dept, Rd., etc.)<\/p>\n

Be sure to vote in both polls to the right (er, I mean if you WANT to); it’s common when we do two polls for the first of the two polls to get significantly more votes than the second. Heck, let’s throw in one more poll: Jacob or Maximus? And be sure to leave other suggestions in the comments section. [All three polls closed; see results below.]<\/p>\n

Poll results for “The Initials MGD” (479 votes total):<\/p>\n