Ms. Westmont, if you please

I'm still getting used to the new routine, one week on and one week off at a time. The weeks without the kids are all about me, which makes me feel strangely guilty and self-indulgent, but Note To Self: you live alone now. Who else are the lonely weeks going to be about? The dog?

Speaking of that little shit, Harry's with me full-time and apparently he's PISSED. He routinely craps on the floor and twice now he's peed on my bed. I'm not talking about a few measly drops from getting overly excited, either, I'm talking an EMPTIED BLADDER. The second time I found it the hard way: I took my vitamins, brushed my teeth, turned the lights off and fell face down directly onto a wet pillow. A SOAKING wet pillow. THAT was fun, lemme tell you. Guess who's having a hard time adjusting to the move? And guess who had to invest in rubber sheets?

Anyway, what was I getting at? That living alone is giving me a lot of time to think about who I am and who I want to to be. I have the chance to get to know myself all over again from scratch and that feels remarkably good. I'm not saying I haven't been myself all along, but I have been this one very specific version of me. I guess I'm looking forward to figuring out the version of myself that isn't a version at all, if that makes any sense. I'm a grown-up, right? So I get to choose who to be. And I'm trying to be conscientious in my choices.

I even get to choose my own NAME.

I decided a while ago that I'm not going to keep Del Buono. As much as I love the name and wish I could keep it for the kids, it just doesn't feel like it belongs to me anymore. It belongs to Dave. My maiden name isn't much better because that one belongs to my parents and I honestly can't imagine going back to being Amanda Harrison. That girl was a FOOL. A big fat one.

So I've been wracking my brain. Asking everyone from business colleagues to bartenders for suggestions. Researching everywhere and googling my ass off. I wanted to find something I could still register as a .com. That was really important to me. I want to OWN my name.

About a week ago, I found it:

Amanda Westmont

Amanda Marie Penelope Westmont, if you want to get specific.

I figure I can be Amanda Westmont in my every day life. I can write serious fiction as A. P. Westmont (ha! serious fiction! as if!) and my juicier stuff can be written by Penelope Westmont. 

Before you ask how I came up with it, let me just say I was shocked to find out that EVERY domain permutation was still available for this name. I've already registered apwestmont.com, amandawestmont.com, amandapwestmont.com AND penelopewestmont.com. (They all forward to mandajuice.com right now.)

THAT and I was born on Westmont Avenue and I named my first cat Penelope.

Talk about a name I can OWN.

Comments

[Carrisa]

and because Princess Consuela Bananahammock was already taken...

It's a great new last name and I adore the name Penelope. ( I actually love pronouncing it Peena-lope )

Nice to meet you Ms. Westmont.

[Laura]

I like it.

[Sarah]

I love it!

[ccr in MA]

I think it's very cool, you picking a new name. Unfortunately for me, the same logic would name me Honey Mountain, which doesn't have near the ring that Penelope Westmont does! (On the other hand, I'm not planning a new name at this point in time.)

[Kim]

So if I get divorced, I can change my name to Westmont and be your sister? Kewl beans!

Of course, I don't think I'll ever get divorced again. I spent 11 formative years between my divorce and this marriage. Learned a lot about myself and found me a guy to go with my new self.

But I'll still dream about being your psister.

[Jamie]

Damn, I should have done that when I got divorced. I kept my married name out of pure laziness, I had only just changed my name 5 years earlier and it was a pain in the ass and I knew I'd get married again eventually (I did a mere 3 years later) and I'd have to go through it all over again.

[Kelli]

I love this Amanda. Awesome.

[Sarah]

Love it!

[Krystal Jewel Muffin Baldwin]

My new name would be Muffin Baldwin...now that's a name. The first cat I can remember was Muffin and the first street I remember living on when I was 4 or so was Baldwin. Amanda, you are so unique and I adore you for that!!

[cindy w]

I thought of exactly what your first commenter said, the episode of Friends where Phoebe was supposed to change her name to her married name, and instead came back as Princess Consuela Bananahammock. And her husband (Paul Rudd, yum) decided his new name would be Crap Bag. Heh.

If I applied your rule, I'd be Scamp Waverly. So, uhh, no.

[alison]

Fun! I'd be Harley Marvel. Not bad, if I was a dude.

Anyway, I love Ms. Westmont! And Penelope? It's also a really cool song by Pinback. Check it out.

[Lipstick Jane]

Oh Amanda, it's wonderful. I'm proud of you for striking out & creating YOUR life. You go Ms. Westmont. Hang in there. And any time you need to mosey away to Denver, you call. We'll drink coffee, talk about books, or better yet drink heavily since the liquor fairy visits my house regularly.

Ciao chica!

PS When I was younger I wanted to change my name to Rebekah Kennedy-Kaye or Keri Burke-Wadsworth. I even had return labels made. (and don't ask about the hyphenation, for some reason I thought it was cool. It was the 90s after all.) :)

[A'Dell]

This is totally awesome. I never even CONSIDERED that a person could just change her name to something TOTALLY NEW.

Love it. Super classy.

[Rachael]

When my best friend got married, she hyphenated w/her husband. But instead of using her maiden name, she used her Mom's maiden name because her Dad's not in her life. Since that had been her middle name, she got to pick a new middle name. She chose Violet b/c her favorite color is purple, and she a little bit liked it that it sounds kind of like violent.

When I got married, she told me that my husband and I should both change our last names to 'Einhorn' since I love unicorns.

[Sheryl]

I grew up on 79th Ave and our first cat was named Squirt (don't ask). Seventy-ninth Squirt, I'd be. If we go with my cross-street, I'd be Skidmore Squirt. Oy vey!

[Lori Harrison]

Ms. Westmont...love it...Penelope we were given and I changed her name to Kitters....best darn cat! Hugs to you all!

[zee]

wow....

so the people who made your life so great get zero recognition? sweet! no parents. no husband. fuck them.

who cares how the kids feel about their mom having a different name.

good for you - who cares about your husband, kids, parents, mother in law....

as long as you get karaoke and a new name...

i totally get harry's attitude...

feel free to close comments again... but as a long time reader i am so betrayed by your recent screwy behaviour... you used to seem weird (gun toting) but family orientated but now you seem like a mental case.

i get the total feeling that you rested on your laurels for so long and were happy for him to work his butt off while you cruised. but when you had to work, you decided you weren't prepared to really accept the reverse. it's really shallow.. yeh i was prepared to allow this fat fuck to screw me when he earned XX$ but not when i earn the money....

it's so awful...

i don't get why people support you.. and god, yeh, run, but you had to get surgery!!!! ur the same as dave... why didn't you pay for his surgery instead of house stuff.... selfish to the core...

i'd piss on ur bed too...

[Erin]

Hey Zee,
Just move on. There's really no need for that.
No one forces you to read here.

[skyscraper]

I read your blog regularly but I have never commented. Now I feel I must.

Zee - Shut the fuck up!

We can pretend to understand Amanda but we do not. Not fully. She only writes what she wants to write.

I actually think this is an issue with glass half full people. Just because they haven't bitched for 10 years about a situation doesn't mean that everything is great.

It is like glass half full people have made the choice to be happy. Therefore everything they choose to present about themselves and their life is happy. When actually everything is not 100% happy.

So anyway - Zee shut the fuck up.

[Amber]

Well then! Moving on from that not so lovely comment cruelly designed to make you sink into the depths of despair from someone who deserves no softening explanation, but a few bites of karma might do nicely...

Last night I was just trying to understand, and I think the new name is SWEET. Or Super Sexy. Or Lascivious. Oh yes. Definitely that.

Keep on discovering,

Cricket Carlton

[E]

Amanda... Are you serious?  I have to say this sounds completely ridiculous!  Honestly, I am beginning to wonder if you have lost your mind!  Either that or you are just incredibly immature (or both!).  I understand not wanting to keep Dave's name. Actually, I could understand HIM not wanting you to keep his name (I don't think that is the case though). But, for your children's sake, you would think that you would want to be a seemingly SANE person.  But, then again, your children are clearly not your priority.

Personally, I think this whole thing is not only a slap in the face to Dave and your kids, but also a slap in the face to your family.  I think Zee said it right (albeit a bit crudely).  To say that using your family name would be a girl who is a "big fat fool" is just awful.

Leave Dave aside for the moment here. Obviously, your parents are financially supporting you because there would be NO WAY you can support yourself working only part time.  So, you take their financial support, emotional support, etc. But to use your birth name, your family name, a name you should be proud of... is not something you want to do.  Big fat fool and all!  This is sickening!

Then, you say that Amanda Harrison was a big fat fool - who married Dave and had his kids... even more sickening.  

I am also appalled at the people commenting here.  How can anyone in their right mind think that this is NORMAL, rational and/or commendable behavior?  They must think that you are just joking around or something, because if not, then our society must be scarier than I thought.

Seriously though, Amanda or Penelope or whoever you are now, you mostly just sound insanely and selfishly immature.  It's like your 34 going on 12.  You really need to grow the hell up and see that your behavior is disgusting.  The fact that you cannot rationally or logically reason this out for yourself just shows how selfish and morally depraved you really are.

[Sara]

Hmmm...maybe I should change my name too. I'd be Puffy Paradise. I might have to change occupations though (I'm an accountant). :)

[Amanda Westmont]

Guess what, E?

I was born with a VAGINA.

So my parents pretty much knew from the get-go that that my chances of staying Amanda Harrison were slim to none. And Dave is 100% on board with my not keeping his name. He prefers it this way.

The kids? Well, I may be wrong here, but I'm pretty sure they think of me as... MOM. Not Mom Del Buono. Or Mommy Harrison. Just mom.

I had a wonderful childhood with wonderful parents. And I'm keeping the two beautiful names that they actually CHOSE for me: Amanda Marie.

As for the big FAT fool thing?

I'll never regret marrying Dave. He was a good husband and he gave me my two beautiful children. But I still associate Amanda HARRISON with a FAT GIRL. LITERALLY.

I don't want to be reminded of the FAT girl every time I sign my name. I said goodbye to her a long time ago and see no reason to bring her back from the dead.

Amanda Westmont is not a fat girl. She's a runner. A writer. A grateful daughter. She's flawed as hell, sure, but she's trying.

And E? You can kiss her pasty white ass.

[E]

Nice to see that you cowardly deleted my comment again which funnily enough is nowhere near as harsh as Zee's comment. Which goes to show you can't handle anyone using your own words against you and that even though you say your readers are "mission critical" you only regard them as mere strangers that really mean nothing. Of course you will probably delete this too, but you will really never know how many people have seen this.

Also aren't you supposed to be working? Clearly your blog is more important to you than your job because you are sitting there with bated breath waiting to delete my comments within seconds of posting.

[Helen H.]

I do agree with E (funnily enough, I now notice their comments are gone? Yet, you responded to them, so where did they go?). I think this sounds so immature and childish. Grow up! You are a divorced, mother of TWO CHILDREN, not some bent-back-by-I-can't-believe-it-is not-butter-Fabio character in one of the romance novels that you have spent WAY TOO MUCH of your time (by your own admission) reading. Really?

Also, I think it is pretty offensive that you have so little respect for YOUR own father (who you have claimed to be one of your favorite people) that you would toss his name by the wayside like you have by saying that "Amanda Harrison was a big fat fool". Here is a bit of information- you ARE Amanda Harrison and will always be! A name is not what makes you a fool, your behavior makes you a fool. One cannot wipe away their past or lessen their accountability by changing their name.

I also think E is on to something when he/she said that there is no way you can be supporting yourself working 4 hours a day- so you must be getting something from your parents- which makes this even MORE offensive!!! That apartment looks awfully nice to cost what you can afford on your own- not to mention your ability to rent it w/a foreclosure looming? Seems like a co-signer is in order??

As for Dave, well, he should be glad that you are choosing to give him back his name. Can't be certain, but I would have to think that he must be both flabbergasted and laughing his butt off at this recent move.

And for all of you on here who have commented about how wonderful this all is- out of sheer curiosity, how many of you actually KNOW Amanda(AKA- Amanda Westmont, Amanda Marie Penelope Westmont, A.P. Westmont, Penelope Westmont)in real life?

Oh- and I also see that you have now deleted this off of E's comments-

"Then, you say that Amanda Harrison was a big fat fool - who married Dave and had his kids... even more sickening. You sent me an email stating that you are trying to "save his fucking feelings and his ego. He's lost enough! The last thing Dave needs is to be dragged publicly through the mud so I can justify to a bunch of strangers why I left him." Then in that same email, you said to me, "I might not be his wife anymore, but he still comes first. He is the father of my children, so he always will." Yeah, Amanda Westmont, that is what you are doing - putting Dave's feelings first here by saying the girl that married him was a "BIG FAT FOOL." How do you not see what you are doing?

Interesting that your readers' feedback is "mission critical"- but, you obviously only want that which casts the best light on you and does not call you out on your behavior. Glad I noticed before I posted this- it makes this all the more telling.

Deleting parts of readers' posts? Hmmm....