Why I Changed My Name at Age 79

I married late in life. I was too busy to do otherwise. Exciting career with leaps and bounds of advancement. My ever expanding team of employees who looked to me for leadership and guidance. The fulfilling volunteer work and my hobbies to fill in the gaps. Romance wasn't even on my mind.

But when I finally, and inadvertently, found the love of my life on a rare vacation in Italy, my perspective radically shifted. I was no longer simply me, vice president of operations, master gardener and amateur chef. I was part of a couple. And I wanted every part of that, including his last name.

For fifteen wonderful years, I carried that name proudly...lovingly. Sharing his last name meant I was sharing his life - and he was sharing mine, giving that part of himself and his very different heritage to me. And a part of myself, a large part, died when he died at age 70.

For eighteen further years, I continued to bear his name. It was part of me now, after all. It was my way of keeping that connection. But time has a way of changing matters. Like a rushing stream, it erodes and carves and wears away the hardest rock.

I didn't need my lost love's name to keep my connection to him. I had my memories and my permanently etched emotions. His name began to feel like...a fraud.

My late husband's heritage was not mine. I had not grown up on that soil. I had no root-deep connection to the people or the culture. His family had never warmed to me nor I to them.

On the contrary, I began to think more and more about my own roots, my own family. My own name. That name was my true identity.

It was the name I wanted on my gravestone.

It isn't as easy to change your name from your husband's back to your maiden name. It takes more than one simple form, so easily and blithely signed off on thirty-four years before. But at this point, I was committed. I wanted to be me again.

The day I got my name back, I celebrated. It was a small celebration, consisting of one. I opened my wedding album, and I toasted my lost love in the photograph of a vital, obviously elated middle-aged man in his wedding suit. I knew he understood.

On his gravestone, after all, is his original name.

The next day, I signed a check using my true name. It was to pay for my gravestone. I will be laid to rest next to my love - but I will be me.