What's in a Name?

With everything else in the news these days, you may not have caught the ridiculous name eccentric billionaire Elon Musk and his bizarre celebrity girlfriend Katie Grimes named their new son a few weeks ago. I’d have to look it up to get it right, but let’s just say it looks like a bunch of random letters. In fact, it even included numbers before they discovered that’s not legal in California. And although they claim the name has great meaning, I’m of the opinion they should hire the kid a psychologist now. If he doesn’t need one over his parents, he will need one over his name.

But, you say, “Ellyson” isn’t exactly on the top 100 list for girls names in 2020. And you would certainly be right. Where did we get that name? Well, it started when I was pregnant with Ethan. We were coming up with a girl’s name and I liked “Ellie”. Ed wasn’t too excited about it, so he finally asked if there wasn’t a name we could give her and then call her “Ellie”. I pulled out my list of names I keep for writing purposes and started listing off ones that would work like that. And he liked Ellison. I also liked it, so we agreed. But then we had Ethan and didn’t need a girl’s name after all.

Over three years later, we still both liked Ellison. And until about six weeks ago, I was leaning more towards using the spelling with an “I”. But then I was talking to my dearest friend Allyson, marveling as I always do after talking with her how godly she is and how blessed I am to have her in my life, even if I can’t live next door to her. It has crossed my mind many times that if I had a dozen children, I would eventually name one in honor of her. But as that seems extremely unlikely…well, I could at least get close and spell the name Ellyson. And so we have.

It’s probably no surprise that Ellyson literally means “Son of Ellis”. The name Ellis has two meanings. First, it is English form of the Greek name “Elias” which is a form of “Elijah” and means “Jehovah is God”. It is also a Welsh name which means “Benevolent”. Two meanings I hope she strives to remember and live.

Her middle name is simple enough: Christine. It’s the name I wanted to use should I ever have another daughter and Ed was willing, despite having at least two former girlfriends by that name. Why? It’s the name of my sister who was stillborn almost 36 years ago. I wanted my daughter to have her name in memory of her and as a gesture to my parents. It’s a name I hope Ellyson will treasure of a person who may not have lived long on earth but impacted many people. 

Ellyson Christine. I may be biased, but it really is a pretty name.