I had a hard time getting rid of my last name. it was something i was so proud of growing up. Everyone knew who the Medinas were, even if they didn't quite know who i was specifically, people knew of me because they knew my brothers.
When i got married i didn't want to give up the last name so i hyphenated it and dropped my middle name instead. it was too much anyway and my mom was the only one who used my middle name, when she wanted to make me mad.
Medina, MN is about 45 minutes outside of Minneapolis and i just had to go see it when we moved to Minneapolis. There isn't much to it. i can remember a bowling alley, a motel, and two water towers. Not much to mean much to me about the town but the surname means a lot to me and although I have four brothers to carry on the family name, I just couldn't let go.