Leading up to the birth of our first son, Chloe (my girlfriend at the time) and I struggled to find the perfect name. After weeks of back and forth, we finally agreed on “Keats,” in honor of Chloe’s favorite grandmother and my favorite poet. It didn’t take long for Chloe to settle on Keats Allison Burnett. I was flattered but not content. I decided to push my luck.
“How about Allison Keats Burnett?” I asked.
She conceded that while mine sounded better, hers had the distinct advantage of not being a girl’s name that would ruin his life.
“Whoa, whoa,” I said. “My father and I are both named Allison and we turned out fine.”
She blinked her disbelief. “Your father drank himself to death at forty-seven.”
I might have gotten defensive here, except that I knew my dad’s untimely death had nothing to do with his girl’s name, and I could prove it. I sashayed to my study and returned with a well-thumbed copy of Let’s Name The Baby, published in 1935, three years after my father’s birth. I showed Chloe where Alison, with one I, was listed as a rare girl’s name of Teutonic origin, meaning “of sacred fame.”
Then I flipped and showed her where Allison, with two I’s, was listed also as a rare boy’s name, meaning the same thing. There it was in black and white. My father’s being named Allison could not have driven him to drink because at the time he received it, it was a boy’s name, too. If she needed to blame something for his self-destruction, I suggested that she look no further than his Irish heritage and his unresolved castration complex, and leave Allison out of it.
She smirked. “And what about you? The name obviously didn’t do much for your virility.” Outraged, I flung my hands onto my hips and asked her what the hell she was talking about.
She counted on her fingers: “Youre tidy, you love Arts & Crafts furniture, you hate smoky bars, you moisturize, you’re afraid of roller coasters, you collect miniature lead farm animals, and you write chick flicks.”
I managed somehow to stay calm. “Look at me. Look at what I’m wearing. I dress like a homeless person. I love baseball, football, and boxing. I spit on the sidewalk for no reason. I rarely wash my car. I have a filthy mouth. I’m logical.”
“I didn’t say you were a woman. I’m just saying that growing up with a girl’s named affected you, that’s all.” Her smile was gloating.
I gathered myself. “Okay, listen up. Would you agree that the most crucial years in a child’s psychological development are birth through five?”
“Sure.”
“So, if growing up with a girl’s name affected my psyche, wouldn’t it follow that the worst damage was inflicted during these years?”
“Sure.”
“Well, joke’s on you, because Allison didn’t become a girl’s name until I was almost six.”
She cocked her head like a terrier when it hears a siren. I walked her to my computer and laid out the facts: On September 15, 1964, three months and a day before my sixth birthday (and fifteen years to the day before my father’s liver gave out), the primetime soap opera, Peyton Place, made its debut on network TV. One of the characters was a waif named Allison Mackenzie. Viewers didn’t care or even notice that Allison spelled her name like a boy, they just knew that they loved her. Overnight, the actress who played her, Mia Farrow, became a household name, and Allison with two L’s became one of the most popular girls’ names in the English-speaking world.
“So you see,” I concluded, “my love of Antiques Roadshow and Christmas ornaments has nothing to do with my name, because my psyche was formed before Allison even became popular. I never even met a female Allison until I was ten.”
“But I bet you never met a male one either.”
“My dad.”
“Oh, right. Well, let’s forget masculinity. What about your self-esteem? You were never teased?”
I conceded that I was teased all the time, but only by adults. “Did your parents want a girl?” they’d cluck. “What’s your sister’s name — Hank? What’s your last name — Wonderland?” I was never wounded by it, just dismayed that grown-ups could be predictable and stupid. As I got older, the teasing stopped and the name actually became an asset. Girls in the 1970s found it exotic and sexy (in the same perverse way that they slobbered over David Bowie and Freddy Mercury). Rather than downplay my androgynous side, I began to cultivate it. I grew my hair long and wore lavender sweater vests. I learned the Spanish Hustle. I even got my ear pierced. Conservative girls didn’t dig it, but the liberal ones sure did. Then, in the 1980s, when Elvis Costello hit the scene, Allison became even cooler. Pretty strangers began crooning my name at me, praising my aim and accusing one of my friends of taking off my party dress.
In the 1990s, when my career as a writer took off, the name created wonderful confusion. When I sold the original screenplay for Autumn in New York, producers called my agent and said. “I’ve been following Allison’s work for years. I’d love to meet with her again. Is she available?” When I wrote and directed an indie film about misogyny, a critic wondered how a woman knew so much about the despicable minds of men. And when I began publishing novels narrated by a drunk, bipolar gay man, eyebrows were raised. My novel, Undiscovered Gyrl, is narrated by a seventeen-year old girl. When the manuscript was submitted to publishers, my agent didn’t tell them my sex. He was perfectly happy for my name to mislead them.
I concluded, “I love my name, and I always have. I love that it’s unique. Unisex. I even love that it creates confusion. But most of all I love that it was my father’s name, too. It’s a wonderful tradition and I think we should keep it alive.”
Chloe reflected for a few seconds, then surrendered. “Allison Keats Burnett it is.”
I gulped hard.
Now that I had won, it was time for me to give the matter some serious thought. Did I really want to saddle my son with a name that is exclusively female? Would passing on the tradition draw him closer to me and his dead grandfather, or would he resent it and change his name first chance he got to Lance, Chad, or George?
Less than virile, I decided to compromise.
Today, legally, our son’s name is Allison Keats Burnett, but we call him Keats, and so does everyone else. This means that throughout his formative years he will not even know that he has a girl’s name. He won’t learn it until the first day of school when the teacher calls out his name and everyone roars with laughter, but by that time his self-esteem will be rock solid.
Allison Burnett is an an American author, director, and screenwriter. His latest psychological thriller, The Last Girl Podcast, is the third of his Katie Kampenfelt trilogy, which began with Ask Me Anything. Find out more at allisonburnett.com.
