This name game’s a crying shame

IN Saturday’s paper we saw varying opinions about some less-than-appropriate street names in our region.

Chiton Way in Point Lonsdale got the debate started after the Geelong council changed its name.

And then a host of other snigger-worthy street names were revealed: Bogan St. Coxon Pde. Thrush St. Snigger, snigger, snigger.

But inappropriate names aren’t confined to streets. My family doctor was Dr Gore. True story.

And who could forget McCracken Chiropractic Clinic, meat manager Brad Slaughter or urologist Robert Leake?

I, too, have an unfortunate name, and I have spent the best part of my life advising people that my name is pronounced with a ‘Y’ not an ‘I’.

”It’s pronounced Wynd — but don’t wind me up about it,” I joke for the umpteenth time, fake laugh at the ready. “It’s not wind as in flatulence, it’s wind as in wind-up toy.”

It doesn’t help that some parts of the Wynd family actually do use the farty pronunciation of the name.

I’m more likely than not to correct people, but after more than four decades it becomes tiresome. Not for my dear mother, though. Not even born with the name, she took to defending its pronunciation more than 50 years ago and hasn’t stopped. When telemarketers (or anyone, for that matter) call and mispronounce our surname by asking to speak to Mrs Wind, she responds by telling them “There’s no one here by that name” and promptly hangs up. Possibly a good tactic to dealing with pesky callers — although she doesn’t just limit her pronunciation lessons to phone callers. When Scott Wynd won the AFL Brownlow in 1992 I thought it was the end of my endless corrections of mispronunciations. Alas, no.

Then 10 years ago I got a get-out-of-jail ticket when I married my husband, Tony Wills. But I chose to keep my maiden name. (And don’t get me started on the term ‘maiden name’ — maybe that’s a topic for my second Take Two, if I ever get asked back).

So I’ve kept my birth name (because I’m not a ‘maiden’) as it is has been my newspaper byline for more than two decades, and I just use my married name when I want to make a complaint. And you’d think with such a simple name as Wills the pronunciation dilemma would never crop up.

But you wouldn’t believe the number of people who ask “Is that spelt W-e-l-l-s?”

Aargh!