Last weekend, I was enjoying a lovely Easter gathering when the conversation suddenly turned to baby names.
It was an innocent enough attempt to keep the small talk flowing. Someone simply asked my friend's pregnant sister what names she was considering.
To which she casually replied, "Well, if it's a girl, we're thinking of 'Sophia'..." I smiled politely and said, "Oh, what a nice name."
But what I really wanted to do was scream, "Back off bitch - Sophia's mine!"
Why such a venomous reaction?
See, as a 30-something woman who hasn't met the future father of her children yet, my mental list of favourite baby names is being raped and pillaged by women beating me to the baby-breeding punch.
And I'm not the only one who feels that way.
I know corporate careerists who are a little anxious about their ever-shrinking name lists.
I also know indie-rock types who are somewhat territorial about their endangered name lists.
The whole thing has driven one of my best friends to put an unofficial pending patent on "Marianne," which basically means no one in her extended circle of friends can touch it.
As a diehard fan of Marianne Faithfull and all things Rolling Stones, agreeing to this was a huge concession on my part.
So I did it with the understanding that "Sophia" is all mine!
But telling that to a friend of a friend, who already has a bun in the oven, is futile.
First come, first serve, right?
And at the rate my friends and colleagues are pumpin' 'em out, the only girl names left will be Candy or Crystal - not that there's anything wrong with working the pole at the No. 5, I just don't want to pigeonhole my daughter into a career.
So I'm thinking of taking a new tack - a little bit of the ol' reverse psychology, if you will. The next time a glowing mother-to-be starts sniffing around my list, I'll react with, "Sophia? Really? It's so done. What about Shirley or Deb? - Just as timeless and beautiful, but not nearly as cliche."
If that doesn't work, I could always throw out a decoy name like Myrtle. I figure if I plug the name Myrtle at every baby shower, Christening or children's birthday party I attend, I can build enough hype to make Myrtle the must-have millennium girl's name - sorta like what Jack is to boys right now, which of course replaced Dylan, which replaced Jesse, James and Jason.
In fact, the only thing hotter than Jack right now is geographical namesakes - thankfully, that's just not my bag.
So you can keep your countries, cities and NYC boroughs. But when it comes to Oscar, Leo and Jude, the race is on. These are, without a doubt, my top three favourite boy names of all time ... or, are they?
