My name is S\u00e9amas O\u2019Reilly, or at least I thought it was until recently. The confusion started some years ago, when my father cast a wry glance at the cover of my memoir.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhy\u2019d you add the fada?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have a fada,\u201d I said, to the man I presumed had named me. \u201cI don\u2019t think so,\u201d said he, with that tone he uses when I suggest he doesn\u2019t need to apply a kilogram of butter to every scone he eats. In his defence \u2013 on the name thing, not his overuse of butter \u2013 my father has 11 children, and misremembering a fada would rank quite low on his all-time list of mix-ups in this sphere. Each of us grew up accustomed to the machine gun rattle of different names being tried out, in sequence, any time he wished to call just one of us. (I believe his record for me is six other names before he reached my own, comprising five of my siblings and the dog).<\/p>\n
I replied that if he had no memory of it, my late mother <\/a>must have done the deed; a flourish that she, as an Irish teacher, would have been more likely to commit than he. My father scoffed at the suggestion and implied the only flourish he could see within this embarrassing saga was my own; a desperate attempt to infuse my name with an exotica it did not possess. <\/p>\n Chagrined, I turned to my siblings\u2019 groupchat and found half of them were sure I had a fada, while half swore total ignorance. Articles in my name, and even my passport, I was told, proved nothing, since they were self-reported \u2013 and thus suspect. <\/p>\n [\u00a0S\u00e9amas O\u2019Reilly: \u2018My little boy is the same age now as I was when my mother died\u2019Opens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n It was only some months later, when I put my hands to my long-form birth certificate (for other reasons, I swear), that the matter was put to rest. By which I mean, my father shrugged and changed the subject, granting me zero personal satisfaction from the exchange whatsoever.<\/p>\n I was reminded of this fight for my fada a few weeks back, when Sinn F\u00e9in TD Aengus \u00d3 Snodaigh tabled a Bill in the D\u00e1il to protect fadas in Irish names and addresses, prompting a bit of sabre-rattling between those who think it\u2019s high time we preserved and celebrated these charming motes of our cultural heritage, and those who don\u2019t really see why we should bother. <\/p>\n As the above anecdote may have already illustrated, I\u2019m all for the Bill, since I do consider my fada part of my actual name \u2013 a belief many Irish people, services and institutions seem to equate with me demanding I be addressed as His Eminence, Lord of All Creation.<\/p>\n