Names Ending in “X”

Hi, you have A Way with Words.

Hi there. This is Lan from Laguna Beach.

Hello, Lan. Welcome to the program.

Hi. Thanks, Kat.

What can we do for you?

Well, I was emailing a fellow mom about getting our kids together, and in part of her email response, she kind of explains that she’s an English major and she has the knack for syntax and grammar, that I was spelling the possessive form of my son’s name incorrectly. And since I have to deal with it the rest of my life, she thought she would correct me. And his name is Hendrix with an X. And I was spelling it with an X apostrophe.

So I’m utterly confused because I looked it up and I think I totally confused myself between the plural form and the possessive form.

Hendrix, that’s a great name.

How old is your kid?

Four.

Four.

Okay.

And so is he after the musician?

Actually, he is, yes. My husband plays bass guitar.

So H-E-N-D-R-I-X.

Right.

Well, you know, in my family, that is a family name. It’s my father’s middle name, and he is the fourth generation of someone to have that as a middle name. So it’s the same spelling.

So your question is, how do you make it possessive? And you’ve been just putting an apostrophe at the end, right?

Yeah, like all my birthday invitations, Hendrix’s third, Hendrix’s fourth. And if I’ve been spelling it wrong, I think I should be correcting it from this point forward.

Yeah, I don’t think you need to recall the invitations or anything.

No, no, no.

And there’s no mea culpa’s due here. I think this is a forgivable…

Oh, sure.

If you’re talking about his birthday, then you say Hendrix’s birthday?

Yeah.

Yeah.

When you’re talking it loud, when you say it out loud, that’s what you say, right? You don’t say Hendrix’s birthday.

Right, exactly.

Yeah.

And I think you’ll find that you’ll see lots of different rules for this. But my rule, my personal rule, is just punctuate it the way it sounds. And to me, you would put an S on the end of that. Hendrix, apostrophe S, Hendrix’s. Because that’s the way you say it. I mean, I tend to lean towards simplicity in grammar and consistency. And I think that makes the most sense, but it’s not terrible to do it the other way.

Okay, so it’s not, well, it seems so cumbersome to do X apostrophe S, because sometimes, if you just only, phonetically speaking, sometimes we just do, say, Hendrick’s car. You know, it kind of rolls off, so it’s not, but if it’s grammatically, like, a major blunder, I mean, of course, I’ll do the X apostrophe S. I mean, is there a steadfast rule?

Well, you’re right. If you’re talking about his swimsuit, you know, it’s probably going to come out like Hendrix’s swimsuit, right?

Yeah.

Rather than Hendrix’s swimsuit. But I’m with you, Martha. I think, and this is not a terrible misstep. This is not a big boo-boo. This is nothing to, like, you know, beat yourself up over.

Yeah, you don’t have to change the kid’s name.

No.

Apostrophe S is the best choice. The apostrophe is the second best choice. Your friend, though, probably, even though she may have thought she was doing a favor and it sounds like she was kind of nice about it, should mind her own business.

Oh, yeah.

But I do appreciate the fact that she did bring it to my attention.

Okay, good.

Because, yeah.

Because you get to talk to us. It kind of falls in that spinach in the teeth category, right? Like the fly down territory. It’s like, do you tell them, do you not? And I appreciate it. Sometimes we go ahead and tell somebody even though it’s none of our business. So I don’t know what your relationship with her is. Maybe you’re good enough friends where you can just laugh this off. But most people are going to choose the apostrophe S.

Right.

So no need to issue a formal apology or anything like that.

Okay.

Okay, thank you.

Happy birthday to the little man.

All right.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

Thank you for calling.

Bye.

Well, if you’re having a grammar dispute with somebody, give us a call, 1-877-929-9673, or send an email to words@waywordradio.org.