My last name is St. Martin and for some reason, for my entire life, seemingly literate folk have struggled with how to pronounce it. Street Martin, St'martin, Martin--like the St. wasn't even there--etc. This has always baffled me because we are all exposed to any number of "Saints" in our every day lives. Notwithstanding virtually every Catholic church and hospital being a St. Somebody, we've got towns and cities all over the world: St. Louis, St. Catharines, St. Albans, St. Croix, St. Petersburg, St. Maarten--seems everyone knows what and where St. Maarten is but not St. Martin. We've got the Charles Bronson movie St. Ives--everyone knew how to pronounce that. We've got Jill St. John, the lovely actress who most notably starred as Tiffany Case in the James Bond movie Diamonds Are Forever. Phone books the world over are filled with Saints. Not to mention, the St. Bernard is one of the most famous and recognizable dog breeds in the world!
Still, folks who don't know me regularly refer to me as Mr. Martin. This has come in handy when a telemarketer calls and asks for Greg Martin ("Sorry. No one here by that name.") But mostly I find it insulting. I mean, if I meet a guy named Fitzgerald I don't call him Mr. Gerald.
Where I've had the most difficulty is with computers which can't recognize a last name with a space or a character in it. Some can. I can enter my name as St. Martin and there's never any trouble. Others I can leave a space with no period, like on Facebook, and still others require all the letters run together. In the Navy I was STMARTIN and on my driver license I'm STMARTIN. In school and on the job It was always St. Martin.
As for computers, allow me to share two anecdotes. Not too long ago the parishioners at my church were asked to go online and register with the Hartford Archdiocese to receive email updates on legislative activities affecting Catholics. I went to their site and, guess what.....that's right: I could NOT enter my name as St. Martin--had to use STMARTIN. My immediate thought was, "Well, just how the hell do they enter the names of all their churches if their computer doesn't recognize "St." Hellooooo....."
Next, I recently needed to rent a car. I first signed up for the rental company's reward program under the name of Greg St. Martin. They accepted that as my name and my membership card has that name on it. HOWEVER! When I tried to actually rent the car the system wouldn't accept it, saying I have an invalid character in my name. The system then, apparently just to stick it to me further, wouldn't allow me to edit my name in my profile. When I called in to customer service I was told that even they couldn't edit my name. Ultimately, I came up with a clever work-around to circumvent the system and still have my name as St. Martin on the reservation.
So that's my rant for now. Any other Saints out there wish to share any name-related anecdotes please do so.
