My mother is the oldest of three girls and the only one that took her husband’s last name when she married. When I thought about getting married, I took it for granted that I would change my name, and felt sad about it. I’m not sure when it occurred to me that I didn’t have

I am right now listening to the presidential inauguration of Barack Obama. On this weekend’s This American Life, reporters traveled around the country to get reactions to Obama’s eminent presidency. There were fewer negative reactions than I expected. One journalist put it: “No candidate would run on a slogan of ‘cautiously optimistic,’ but that seems