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I remember an episode of Criminal Minds where one of the psychopaths is asking one of the profilers what his name is. The profiler says Gideon and the psychopath proceeds to list the meanings of the name. Lists the heritage of the name. Then he lists his own name and the heritage and meaning behind it. 

I couldn’t help but think the writers find names as fascinating as I do. Names tell the world all about you. 

My name is Robert Ross Whalen. I use all three. Does this make me a serial killer? 😊 

Robert is a popular name for a boy. There is really nothing that stands out about the name. I looked mine up in the Dictionary of Names. I wrote a blogpost not too long ago talking about alternative dictionaries. I never did think there would be one for names. 

Robert means bright fame in its English version but in its German form it means glory. It is supposed to mean I have a bright disposition or maybe I am bright as in intelligent. I don’t know. I hate the name. I have been called Ross by those who know me since long before I can remember. I have only been called Robert when I was in trouble or when it was a formal need such as court or when I joined the Navy. Robert is not the name I choose and those who use it when talking to me soon learn I don’t answer to it.

I simply don’t think of myself as a Robert.  

The use of names is as important as a name itself. I hate it when someone assumes I am a Bob or Bobby. I am neither. I am Ross. Which is another interesting name, I think. It is not a common name unless you go to Tennessee. There it is a surname. Quite popular surname in Tennessee and there are a lot of Ross’s in the L.A. region of California as well. 

The name Ross has origins in Scotland, Ireland, and Germany. In the Scottish and Irish it means promontory. A peninsula. A piece of land which juts out into the water. In German it means Red. The color and it is also a surname. 

When you look the name up in the dictionary, a regular one, it is both a noun and a verb. The noun means the rough exterior of bark and the verb is to remove the rough exterior of bark. 

My last name has an interesting genealogy. One I learned in perhaps the most unusual place I would ever think to learn it from. When I was in the Navy, I was part of the nuclear repair world. I was working at Subase Pearl Harbor where they gave out random urinalysis twice a week. 

I say random, however, I was chosen to give a sample every week. So much for random. One day I was giving my sample when the monitor behind me asks me if I know the origin of my last name. At that time, I didn’t care. All I wanted was to dump the two sodas I drank before I my bladder exploded. 

Anyways, the man continued to tell me how my version of Whalen was a bastardized version of the original name. It is an English name. The original name was spelled Whelan. When King Henry VIII decided to break with the Catholic church and form his own with him as its head, those who followed King Henry VIII changed their name from Whelan to Whalen. 

Then we proceeded to kill each other with glorious glee over some King’s need to divorce his first wife. What a crock, but there it is.

The largest groupage of Whalen’s I have found live in Nova Scotia. It seems to be a family thing. I don’t know. I am not big on family.

This is the story of my names. I am a bright red peninsula who killed in the name of a religion created by an egocentric King who didn’t give a rat’s ass about me and mine. 

What do your names say about you?

I’m Ross, the Editor-in-Chief at The Pyrateheart Press and I’m out.