Naming

I am often asked how I got the name, Payton. Despite popular belief, I wasn’t named after famous athletes such as Walter Payton, Gerry Peyton, or Peyton Manning. No, no, no, my parents don’t even know who these people are, having zero interest in professional athletics.

When my parents were young, they didn’t have many expenses and no children to occupy their time, so they would give into their passion for film by indulging at the movie theater.

While my mother was pregnant with me, my parents went to see the movie, “The Hand That Rocks The Cradle.” The movie follows a deranged woman, Peyton Flanders (Rebecca De Mornay), who loses both her husband and child in a tragic series of events. Peyton enacts revenge over the woman responsible for the death of her family by psychologically manipulating the situation in which Peyton replaces her as the wife and mother in the woman’s family.

Despite Peyton’s creepy, mind-fuckery factor, she enchanted my father (honestly, the mind-fuckery, creepy, crazy aspect to her character was probably on of the reasons he found/finds her so enchanting). He loved the way she dressed. She personified his idea of the perfect woman with her preppy and classic styling, not to mention the fact that she was 5’7”, blonde, blue eyed, and slim figured—his criteria for the perfect female. He’s fully aware of how shallow he can be. He’s a Taurus. I suppose he hoped, aspired really, that his own daughter would one day become the perfect woman as well, embodying Rebecca De Mornay, or Peyton Flanders.

When my mother was pregnant, my father made it clear only two names were acceptable for his baby girl, Marney and Peyton. This startled my mother because he’d never shown such passion before or had tried to make any family decisions. My dad simply went to his job every day at seven in the morning and came home around four in the afternoon. My mother worked as a phlebotomist and managed the domestic sphere of their lives (i.e. paying the bills and taxes, keeping the house kept, and food on the table). My mother made the majority of the decisions and was the authority in the household and for my dad to try to over step his chosen role (of complacency), not only surprised my mother, but also showed her the excitement my dad felt over my arrival. Now, she had a decision to make: Marney or Peyton.

In my mother’s life time, she had met only one woman named Marney and describes her as being “stout, unsightly, and not overly bright.” BAHAHAHAHAHA My mom thought it was a goofy name to begin with and even she’d feel guilty associating her own daughter with a woman of such caliber. So my mother went out and bought a few books on baby names and did some research on the name Peyton.

Peyton originated as a surname in the anglo-saxon region of the world, but has been adopted by contemporary’s  as a male’s name, which was important to my mother at the time. In the nineties women were gaining respect with the insurgence of the feminist movement, but most people, still embedded with the social ideologies of past generations, did not perceive the genders as equally capable of performing the faculties of, what traditionally were, male professions.  My mother didn’t want her daughter judged on the basis of having a feminine name due to people’s prejudices. She thought the name Peyton embodied strength, confidence, and assertiveness, which are imperative traits for any person, but especially for a female who would later find it her prerogative to make a home in a world made by men. So, by default, I was to be named Peyton.

After 16 hours of labor, my exhausted mother and father welcomed me into the world. Halleluia! Ok. She was so drained she couldn’t fully concentrate on my birth certificate. She thought the name Peyton sounded like it was spelled P-a-y-t-o-n. And while filling out my birth certificate that’s how she spelled it (ummm, where was my father?).

At the end of the day, I was named Payton after one of Rebecca De Mornay’s characters, Peyton Flanders, because my father thought she was h-a-w-t, hawt, spelled with an a not an e because of my mother’s exhaustive nature, but Peyton nonetheless.

When I Grow Up…

So, when I was 9 years old I remember for the first time discussing with my father my future. The typical questions were asked encompassing the general notion that one day my father would no longer take care of me and I’d have to take care of myself. Little did I know, from that moment on I’d be taking care of myself, my innocence lost.

You see, my parents recently divorced, my mother jailed, and my two younger brothers and I left to cope with the circumstances of a series of unfortunate events.

Ever since I can remember I’ve enjoyed long walks. Not for the refreshment of exercise, but for the opportunity to escape the particulars for which I was victim to and dream of the possibilities that might find me tomorrow. In the famous words of Scarlet O’Hara, “After all, tomorrow is another day.”

I’d roam the streets of Curtis Park (and sometimes even go so far as to make my way Downtown) studying the carefully groomed yards and freshly painted homes of “normal” middle-class families. I studied the way the other side lived, wanting so badly to be on that other side. I’d see a mother call her kids in for dinner or a father teaching his son the technique for throwing a curve ball. The “togetherness” of these families seemed palpable.

So, here I am 9 years old discussing with my father my future plans. I was of course going to go to college and since I loved the homes of my neighbors so much I thought it appropriate to design as an architect similar houses for families just like them. And that’s what I told people up until I was 15 years old and a sophomore in high school when anyone asked, “What do you want to be when you grow up?”

Now, at the age of 20 and in my third year of college, when asked that very same question I answer… differently (to say the least). I have since given up the idealism character of my younger self, of the Brady Bunch-esq family unit. Normal is no longer normal (if it exists at all). And here I am about to embark on an adventure unbeknownst to me or anyone else for that matter. Getting to the point of this post (and this blog for that matter) I’m moving to Athens, Greece for six months to study abroad (who knows, maybe I’ll stay and never return to California). Moreover, this blog is about me and growing up and being a “young adult” and being a girl and becoming a woman and all that crap people preach.

So here’s to you and me and being happy!

Cheers and Happy New Year!