The rain in Spain stays mainly on the plain.
As you may or may not know, my last name is Boehm. And as you also may or may not know, I don't like it. That name has caused me many a problem throughout the years. Firstly, I don't think anyone has ever pronounced it correctly the first time--not my teachers in school, or people calling on the phone. Nobody. It's pronounced with a long A sound, like "bame." But that is never anybody's first guess. Oh, I used to hear it from the other kids in school all the time. They'd make fun of my name, mispronouncing it on purpose. They'd call me Brad Bome, or Brad Beehom, or Brad Bo-um, or Brad Bo-hem. I mean, I can't really say that I blame them too much. Come on. How does B-O-E-H-M sound like bame? I don't know. It's German. That's all I know. I don't speak German. I don't want to speak German.
The other major problem I had with that name growing up was that, as a youngster learning to read and spell and write, Boehm proved to be problematic. I knew my last name was spelled B-O-E-H-M. And I knew how it was pronounced. So, naturally, I assumed that the combination of the letters O, E and H was the correct way to spell for the sound that they made in my name in ANY WORD. I can still remember my second grade spelling be . . .
teacher: Ok, Brad, the word is CANE.
me: Cane. C-O-E-H-N. Cane.
bell: DING
me: DAMN IT!
teacher: I'm sorry, Brad. The correct spelling is C-A-N-E.
me: A? What the fuck is A?
posted by Brad @ 1:36 PM
9 Comments:
I am in total sympathy with you - my last name is "RAHE" - it is pronounced like "RAY" but nobody EVER gets it right the first time. It is also German - go figure.
Count me in this club, but with my first name.
In the early seventies, when my psyche was still fragile, Nine Lives Cat Food came out with an extended series of commercials featuring a finicky feline named "Morris."
For the next ten years, the taunt "Morris, time for din din!" was the boehne of my existence.
It all worked out for the best, though. I met my wife when her girlfriend lured me to their table by yelling that after a set, back when I was a musician. (Long long ago, in a galaxy far, far away.)
*Morris Workman
www.morrisworkman.com
workmanchronicles.blogspot.com
dvtsports.blogspot.com
I can almost hear Dave Mauer screaming Brad BEE-ham right now.
Dan Whitmyer, that's WH-IT-MY-ER.
My name is Luke. Can anyone guess what kind of things were said with my name growing up? I hear them in the office even today. I'll even give you a hint. There are two key phrases from a popular movie in which is part of a series in theaters today...
Luke . . . don't force it, Luke.
Although this posting is terribly old ... I just found your blog via google and I read for a while. I like your kind of humor. :-)
I AM German and in Germany you don't pronounce the name as "bane", that's for sure! The "OEH" sounds like "eu" in french "peur", or similar(though not as close as the french word) as the "e" in "jerk". Well... seems like you've suffered for nothing! I pity the fool! ;-)
oh sorry, I meant bame, not bane ;-)
And @ "songofjoy" - in German you would pronounce the name "Rah-he", not Ray. ;-)
Well, I know that back in Germany the name was spelled Böhm. In general they changed all German names that had a vowel with an umlaut over it to that vowel plus an "e" after it, such as Mueller instead of Müller. The pronunciation probably started out properly back in the 1800s but gradually morphed into what it is today.
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