My Name

Caoimhe. to me that name just looks like a garden filled with lovely pink and purple flowers. Although, when it comes to spelling and pronouncing it, its like a garden full of weeds, and a pond with lots of brown and green water, and even a war between the letters! My name is Irish, its spelt in Gaelic and that’s the way its spelt on my passport. It could be spelt Keeva or Kiva, but I like it the way it is. Everyone who reads my name just stops and says “Okay I need some help here!” or something like that. But I’m kind of used to it now. Its really hard when I try to tell people my name, they’re like “What?! How can that be Caoimhe?!” My usual response is “Its Irish!” and they understand immediatally. I like my name, the way its all complicated, I wouldn’t want an easy name. I like having an interesting name, it describes me, I’m and interesting person.

My parents decided to call me Caoimhe Anne O’Reilly after a lot of hard thought and decision. My mum had a complete different idea than my dad. In the end they thought of the name Caoimhe. They wanted to give me and Irish name so people would know straight away I’m Irish. They loved the sound of my name and thought it was really unique although. I don’t see it all. My parents thought the name Emma, Amelia, and Emer were good and that’s what they were going to call me until they found Caoimhe. For short my parents call me Iva, but not in school because that’s my friends sisters name. The name Caoimhe means gentle, beautiful and precious.

Sometimes I wonder do I really match the personality of my name? Well I’m gentle sometimes, I don’t know about precious and beautiful though, I guess that’s what other people are meant to notice, not me, because then I would sound full of myself. Caoimhe is a really eye catching name, like looking at all of these black horses and suddenly you see a grey, you kind of look at it for a while and think “Why is that there?” Caoimhe is the type of name you have to get used to, its like riding boots, you have to get used to the shape to be able to ride easily. Because so many people get it wrong, I could go on and on about all the people who have attempted to spell my name correctly, but not one so far has gotten it correct. There has been only one person who looked at my name and could say it straight away, and that was a random shop keeper in Ireland, well because he’s Irish I guess he has an advantage.

In fact, now that I have written about my name, and described it, I kind of like it. I’ve always hated my name, but now I kind of see it differently. I like how people can look at my name, and know instantly that I’m not and ordinary person, because I’m not. I am Caoimhe, and I’m proud!