Okay, we’re pretty settled now, and we’ve just been doing various touches … you know, crystals and lights, stuff like that.

There’s another transformation that started during my week away, and this one is more personal. I’m changing my name. Just my first name. And I’m not totally giving it up, just shifting it to the middle.

The thing is, I’ve never really felt 100% at home with my name. I was always messing with it when I was growing up, and it rarely seemed to fit. But in adulthood I kind of got to the point where I just let it be. Even though I know quite a few people who have modified their names as adults, I felt like I was too old to be thinking about that sort of thing.

During my week of learning and introspection, I kept receiving little signs that it wasn’t too late. As my classmate said to me at one point, “You have tattoos and a nose ring, and you think that you’re not radical enough to change your name?”

She was right, of course. I had a chance to talk with my teacher privately about it, and she suggested trying it on for the rest of the week to see how it felt. I ended up surprised by how easily it fit. My second surprise came when I broke the news to Pete and the kids, because they were far more accepting than I expected them to be. I’ve told some of my friends and a few co-workers, but I’m still figuring out how I’m going to proceed.

My friend Carrie was kind enough to email me information about common law name changes, which are pretty straightforward and sound simple enough. I’m weighing the pros and cons of a legal name change. I know people who have gone that route as well as those who continue to use two different names.

Another thing I’m figuring out is how (or if) to tell other family members, particularly my parents. Oddly enough, both my parents have modified their names in one way or another, so they might understand. I’m not sure how attached they are to my birth name. After all, they called me by a nickname for the first 10 years or so of my life.

By the way, my new name is Aine. (It’s pronounced awn-yeh. Pete thinks it would be easier to use Anya, but I like the traditional celtic spelling and all four letters are in my original first name. A semi-anagram.)