At the end of a long workday in 2020, I park my Baby Boomer butt on the couch and click, click, click  the TV remote. Here we go. Some guy with groomed stubble yapping about celebrities. An aging actress caught on video in a brouhaha outside an L.A. restaurant, screeching at the gatekeeper who won’t let her in. The TV host sneers at the clip and says: “Don’t be such a Karen!”

What the hell?

I grab my phone to Google my way out of pop culture ignorance. With every scroll and swipe, my little K heart sinks. Karen. Pejorative urban slang for white privilege and racist attitudes. Meme after ugly meme. Dozens of viral videos of obnoxious behavior. A bitchy, create-a-scene shopper berating a store manager. A foul-mouthed, racist blonde, calling the cops on a neighbor who doesn’t look like her.

Biblical scholars suggest that the name Karen is derived from the Hebrew name Keren, which means “horn” or “ray of light” in Hebrew. In the Old Testament, a “horn” represents strength and power, while “ray of light” symbolizes illumination and divine guidance. Etymologists trace the name back to medieval times, declaring it a shortened version of the Danish Katherine, derived from the Greek katharos, meaning “pure.”

Born in 1917, my mother grew up in Saint-Godefroi, a tiny Québec town on the Gaspé peninsula. Anita Grenier was the youngest of six children in a French-speaking family. When she was five years old, her father died in a logging accident, leaving the family in poverty. Unable to feed her family, my desperate Grand-maman sent my mother away to live with a distant aunt for a year, then later to board with the nuns—lonely, harrowing episodes Mom never wanted to talk about. Snippets would slip out now and then when I pressed her about family history.

I toss down my phone, my insides churning. Okay, my name dates me, but how did I miss this social media nastiness until now? Every Karen tarnished with a moniker suggesting a shrill, self-centered crank. My name as clickbait for news media outrage.

Mom’s three brothers left primary school and did whatever manual labor they could find. Yard work. Odd jobs. Reselling scrap. Her sisters worked on and off in a restaurant. Under the nuns’ callous scrutiny, Mom attended the convent school until Grade 7. She paid more attention to honing her reading skills than reciting the rosary. The smallest of mercies.

She taught the little ones at the convent until she turned 18, then moved to Montreal in search of steady work. After picking up English, Mom found a job as a telephone operator. She met a dashing, dark-haired fellow, John Baxter, who worked in a camera store downtown and rode his Norton motorcycle up north on the weekends. After a summer romance at the lake, she married him.

Mademoiselle Grenier, now Mrs. Baxter.

In 2018, the name Karen emerged on Twitter and Reddit as an online stereotype: a loud-mouthed, entitled white woman demanding special treatment or calling the cops on innocent Black people. Videos of offensive incidents grew more outrageous, as so much does online, and the memes grew meaner, amplifying the message. Karens were despicable.

Today, being called “a Karen” still delivers a derogatory sting.

My parents began their life together in the era of Québec’s two cultural and linguistic solitudes. John Baxter was not only English, un bloke—worse yet, he was a Protestant. And his mother had Jewish roots. Mom’s French Catholic family didn’t just skip the wedding, they also shunned her for decades. A marriage by a priest in the transept of a Catholic church did nothing to erase her imaginary sins.

Mom decided her French-Canadian roots were best forgotten. She embraced her new identity as Mrs. Baxter and loved her new neighborhood. Suburban Anglophones lived in cozy brick houses with picnic tables and swing sets in their backyards. Children had plenty to eat and teenagers went to school. She searched for an English-sounding name for her firstborn, something unconnected to small-town superstitions, Roman Catholic saints, or her miserable past. A name that would help her daughter fit in. She chose Karen. The perfect name for a baby girl who would go to college instead of a cruel convent school.

Karen was one of the ten most popular names in North America in the ’50s and ’60s, a trendy choice for baby girls. Mothers of that era chose names beautiful to their ears, breezy and modern-sounding, unlike the staid names of elderly relatives. Aunt Dolores. Granny Mildred. Cousin Edna. No, their daughters would have sharp, catchy names, like Debbie, Nancy, Brenda—or Karen.

Some Karens became famous. Carpenter (singer), Allen (actress), Magnussen (Olympic athlete), Wetterhahn (chemist), Bass (politician), Uhlenbeck (Abel Prize in mathematics).

Others did not.

A little girl named Karen went to Stonecroft Elementary School and dreamed of becoming a teacher. Her mother sewed on her Brownie badges, enrolled her in ballet lessons, and quizzed her every week on the Friday spelling list. And her mother always spoke about school as if it were a sacred place.

My TV blares its vacuous nonsense while those vicious Karen memes spin through my head. Protesting online trends is hopeless, but what can I do?

I can find a way to tell another story about my name. Show the sound and shape of it—[Kair-in], Karen—as it grew in the heart of a young woman from Saint-Godefroi, Québec.

A generation of girls born in the ’50s and ’60s, a generation of Karens, marched as fledgling feminists. Not as NIMBY whiners. Not as spoiled consumers of cappuccinos in throw-away cups. Not as strident shrews. In the ’70s and ’80s, a generation of Karens committed themselves to a more equitable society. We marched—the Shirleys and Beverlys, the Lindas and Karens—trying to move the world forward to a kinder, better place.

When I walked across the stage at Place des Arts to receive my degree from McGill University, Mom’s eyes filled with tears. After the ceremony, grads and guests mingled under glittering chandeliers in the expansive lobby. Young adults posed in mortarboards beside wood-paneled walls while families snapped photos. Dad pointed his camera at me, and Mom arranged the wide sleeves of my convocation gown. All around us the air buzzed with laughter, parental advice, and youthful hopes. My mother said very little.

Later at home, she asked to see the diploma rolled up in the red cardboard tube. Gently, I pulled it out and unfurled the creamy parchment. Mom ran her fingers over the crimson university seal, over the date in Roman numerals, over the words “Karen Anita Baxter” inscribed forever above “Baccalaureus Artium.”

“Voilà,” she said. “I wanted to see your name.”

A TREE WITH MY NAME ON IT

A memoir by Victress Hitchcock

    A Tree with My Name on It: Finding a Way Home is the living, breathing, messy story of one woman trying her hardest to free her wounded heart and uncover her true self.  It is a memoir, told with grace and humor, of the years at the turn of the 21st century when the author moved to a ranch in a remote valley in the Colorado mountains and a path opened to a radically new way of living. Winner of the 2025 Colorado Authors League Memoir Award, this is a story that will resonate with anyone who is seeking a way to connect with their own authentic voice.   “A riveting intimate tale of a woman's journey in search of a home, in her body, her spirit and in the land.” — Tsultrim Allione, Wisdom Rising: Journey into the Mandala of the Sacred Feminine “A heart-wrenching and healing story...” — Jesse Rene Gibbs, Girl Hidden "A quiet triumph of a memoir” — Readers Favorites Silver Medal Winner Learn more about A Tree with My Name on It and the author www.victresshitchock.com

Available from Bookshop, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and your local independent bookstore. Audiobook available on Audible.

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