9. The F Word

9. The F Word
Untraditional is by far an understatement when it comes to my childhood, so it’s not hard to imagine that my name would be any different. My name is Amanda Louis-Kuhnert (what a name huh) as you can see my name is a little unconventional, and it is evidence of an unusual upbringing. Now as an adult I can see that most children struggle with their name and what it means, as far as how we view ourselves.
Looking back to when I was a child, I remember reciting my name in my head over and over again, trying to fit myself into my name. I would look in the mirror and say to myself I don’t think I look like an Amanda, but really what does an Amanda look like?

With the question rumbling through my head, naturally I asked my parents why they gave me a name like Amanda. As I remember my mom humming the tune and then singing the words from that tune… “Amanda, light of my life you should have been a general’s wife” these all inspiring words, is how my name came about.
Amanda means “worthy of love”.

I didn’t always go by Amanda Louis hyphenated Kuhnert is just was Amanda Louis without the Kuhnert. Unlike, Firoozeh my first is very American and like most American traditions, anything outside the box is looked at as unorthodox. My issue is my last name, Louis. As a child growing up I knew that I did not have the same last name as my father, Kuhnert. Wasn’t it my birth right to have my father’s name, we lived in the same home, shared the same meals, and had the same blood; but I had no contract signing me as his.

My agitation did get to me too bad until I was about 9-years-of-age, because no one that I new had their mother’s name. Where I grew up divorce was few, far and between and as an outsider already for living in a home with unwed parents, it was hard for me to explain that Louis was not even my father name.
After my father death, in 2000, I took on my father name; I was finally named as his and what a proud day that was. How did I know it would blow the skeletons clean out of the closet? Still to this day, every time I fill out a form or have to repeat the spelling of my name an eyebrow raises or I get the usual sigh of disbelief, yet, now it doesn’t bother me.

What a vast world we live in. Time passes with an ease uncontrolled and mysterious to the mind. The mind can play taunting tricks on us when it comes to the perception on life. Yet the will keeps us, for some crazy reason, trekking. Why in this wild world would we get so crazed about by a simple name? I guess has to do with the traditional.