Alphabet Soup

I've been married for 2.5 months now, and I'm still tackling the name change issue. I've known for a very long time that I want to keep my birth name as a part of my married name. I love the history behind the name Sembera and its rarity in the US. I love that one can google my name and know that everything written about Megan Sembera is about me. (Good thing there are no skeletons in my closet.) I like that a hyphenated last name will provide me with some professional continuity. Finally, I love the symbolism of a hyphenated last name - not a changeover of families but a merging of the two.

But the internet is scaring me. Apparently many people who hyphenate regret it down the line. Some computers don't recognize the hyphen as a character, banks and credit card companies have a hard time getting it right, women lament the problem of characters and fitting a lengthy last name into required field. Ahh!

My other option is to make Sembera my middle name and lose Alison, my current middle name. This makes me a bit sad though as my parents went through much deliberation to name me Megan Alison, and I even went by Alison for a short time in grade school when Megan became too common. Alas, my heart wants to be Megan Alison Sembera-Peters. I'm giving myself a deadline of 24 more hours....stay tuned for the oh-so-exciting final decision :)