Rosemarie. I love
Laurel and
Ivy, and
Rosemarie goes with them well. I think the plant thing is plenty subtle. It's less subtle with
Juniper, but that hardly matters, in my view. I think of all these names I would rather be
Laurel, and I'd be most likely to use
Ivy. But
Rosemarie is also a great name.
Warning - incoming rant against
Juniper. Don't read if you don't want to hear it.
I'm not sure why
Juniper bugs me and not, say,
Meadow or
Ivy or
River ... but it does. It's a little worse than Rebel in this way (Rebel at least is suggestive of something abstract and significant, especially in some regions), and not as bad as
Calliope. It's acceptable, not horrible, but just really rubs me the wrong way.
Juniper just sounds so bouncy and juvenile to me. Its only substance is that it's spunky-sounding (it smacks slightly of
Jupiter and gin so it's vaguely masculinizing) and oh so herbally fresh. A good name for a bunny. If I met an adult woman named
Juniper, who was not in the entertainment industry, I'm afraid I would think it was awkward and inadequate as a handle ... especially for an accomplished and powerful person. This is how I felt on encountering a professional woman named Rebel ... I thought, nifty name - BUT, it's not good enough for her somehow. It's like grownup
Juniper's name is a relic of her parents' visions of a spunky childhood. Like
Calliope. Or
Piper. Or
Cash or Colt. These names just are not names for
men and women, to me - on adults they'd make me frown and think, gosh, I'm kind of sorry for you, your name's a gimmick.
This message was edited 11/7/2012, 6:18 PM