By Any Other Name...

"A rose by any other name would smell as sweet." - William Shakespeare

In a nutshell, he means names don't matter, you are who you are regardless. I kind of disagree.......

My name is Amman. My brother's name is Navchetan. And i have name envy. Don't get me wrong, I don't hate my name, on the contrary. My name fits my personality more than any other I can think of, short of Gilbert Von Weirdo of course but.......

One of the earliest memories I have of my grandfather is that of him explaining us our names. He named us both. He told me many times "Amman means Shanti, peace". I can't help but wonder if my knowing the meaning of my name and gladly accepting it helped in shaping me. Obviously the pride in which my grandfather told me instilled that pride of it in myself. I AM a peaceful man........

My brother's name, Navchetan, means NEW DAWN. Nav meaning new and Chetan meaning dawn. Now that's exciting. No, that's REVOLUTIONARY! So i think to myself, if I grew into a peaceful man due in large part to the influence of my name, then what if.........

I'm more than happy with my name and I'm proud to be a peaceful man but sometimes, in moments of writing something peaceful again, I have name envy.

PEACE

(this was originally posted on facebook on Aug 5th, 2009)