Just plain Ann

Anne of Green Gables by L. M. Montgomery was an immediate success following its publication in 1908. Set on Prince Edward Island, it tells the story of Anne Shirley, a young orphan with striking red hair, a wild imagination, and a strong sense of justice.

When Anne first arrives at Green Gables, she asks her new parents if they can spell her name with an ‘E’ because she doesn’t want to be just plain Ann.

I understand how she feels. We all want to imagine we are special.

By coincidence, my middle name is also Anne, but opinions on exactly how to spell it have differed over the years.

Born in 1956, I was the third daughter of Leslie and Nola. My two older sisters were given three syllable first names followed by three letter second names – Beverley Joy and Jennifer Lee – so my name needed to comply with the same, somewhat arbitrary, rules. My mother wanted to name me Meredith, but I ended up being christened Margaret Ann.

Just plain Ann. No airs or graces. And this is the spelling I used throughout primary and high school. It’s on all my official documents, including my baptismal certificate, school reports, and swimming certificates.

It wasn’t until I turned 17 and applied for a passport that I found that my middle name was spelt with an ‘E’, just like Anne of Green Gables. It was right there in black and white on the full copy of my birth certificate. No-one had ever noticed the incorrect spelling and I suppose it didn’t really matter to anyone else, but I took it personally. It signalled I was less important than my siblings.

When I raised it with my mother, she explained that because she was busy with three young children, an uncle had been despatched to the registry office to submit the paperwork. I don’t suppose she ever actually looked at the birth certificate.

I started adding an E to my name, but she always spelt it her own way. When we went overseas, we had to fill out a passenger information form and she insisted I had used the wrong spelling. I could not convince her I had to use the version on my birth certificate and passport.

The misspelling of my name was accidental, but it compounded the other ‘evidence’ I had collected to prove that I mattered less than my siblings.

Chief exhibits were my christening mug, which is inscribed with the wrong date of birth, and a baby photo with a note in my mother’s scrawled handwriting: 1956 – not sure who the baby is? She’s holding the baby, and it’s very obviously me. How many babies did she have in 1956?

I badgered her about this for years, trying to make her feel bad by suggesting that I was less valued than my siblings, which was blatantly untrue. She was just a busy mum with three kids and a sick husband.

But I still feel for Anne when she says she wants to be special. She’s desperate to make an impact on the world and it all starts with being seen as someone who’s different and less ordinary.

I want that too. Don’t we all?