More and more married women are holding onto their maiden names. You want to try it, but without any of the awkward conversations with your spouse, friends or family about feminism and personal agency. The solution? Hang onto your maiden name…by writing it on a tiny slip of paper and putting it in a locket around your neck! What’s more empowering than keeping your maiden name in a tiny, secret vault where nobody can see it?
Want to flex that feminist muscle and defy the patriarchy like the women who did keep their maiden names? Here’s a step-by-step guide:
Step 1: Find a locket.
This is tricky, but not quite as tricky as explaining to your coworkers that yes, you’re married, but no, you don’t share a last name with your spouse. Do you by any chance still have your American Girl doll, Samantha? She wore a locket, I think. If that’s a dead end, try Google.
Step 2: Tiny piece of paper time!
An important thing to keep in mind during this next step is that tearing up a piece of paper tiny enough to fit in a locket is hard work. But not as hard as explaining to people why your future children have a different last name than you. Try tracing the locket on a piece of paper and then cutting it down smaller from there.
Step 3: Write out your maiden name!
It’s really nostalgic to write out the name that you lived with for years and that is attached to your career achievements, all your important documents, email and website accounts! As you spell your former name out on that tiny piece of paper, remember: you can always give your future child your surname as a quirky middle name. That should do the trick, right? Whatever, we’re all gonna die someday, so why cling to your identity?
Step 4: Fold that tiny paper up and stick it in your locket!
This is the fun part: Fold the tiny paper up and enclose it in your locket. Now might also be a good time to hope with all your heart that you didn’t fill out all those papers and spend nine hours at the DMV just to do it all over again in reverse if you get divorced. Make a wish on your locket. Lockets have magical powers, right?
Step 5: Wear with pride.
Congratulations! You are now connected to your maiden name forever and that’s something even your new monogrammed towels can’t take away from you.
At the end of the day, this name-keeping keepsake/namesake will be a constant reminder that while you may have taken a new last name, at least you didn’t hyphenate!
