Monday, January 30, 2012

Unique Name? Not Mine!


If you want, Google your name (in quote marks) and see what comes up. You may or may not be unique.
Until I was in my early 40s, I had always assumed my name, Lynn Arave, was unique.
That, I rationalized, was the reward for having that strangely spelled and stated last name.
However, I eventually learned that there were at least two other Lynn Arave's in the world.
In Kentucky, a woman had married into the family and was Lynn Arave too.
Also, a distant relative in Idaho Falls, and older than me, was also named Lynn Arave (actually Lynn J. Arave, vs, my Lynn R. Arave). So, the Idaho Lynn Arave is actually the "original."
There appears to be a huge Arave extended family (in the thousands), startling when you consider that the first Arave, Nelson, was ONLY my great-grandfather. So, I guess it make sense that few Araves may actually have a unique combined first and last name.
Even my mother, Norma Arave, wasn't unique in her name. There was a Norma Arave Earl (recently deceased), as well as an earlier living Norma Arave.
One of my younger brothers, Mark, has also been plagued somewhat with mail/bill confusion, by the older and same-named Mark Arave who lives in the Ogden area.
However, such name confusion doesn't just involve same-named Araves either.
For example, Leonard Arave, the current mayor of North Salt Lake City, Utah, often goes by "Len," a very close name to "Lynn" (see the accompanying illustration). Especially when Len Arave also lived in Layton, Utah, there was occasional phone call confusion going on. It was entertaining far more than annoying, though.

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