What’s In A Name
A while back I wrote a post about why I refer to people in a certain manner. This has been rolling around in my mind again and I felt the need to revisit the topic. I think the main reason this has been playing on my thoughts is that I get irritated if someone calls me by something I really do not like.
It seems to me that the further down the road we go in time, the lazier we become, especially in the United States. It has been a while since I have been to a foreign country, but thanks to the wonderful world wide web, I have many friends and acquaintances around the world. Through them I see other views and customs.
In the past few years in Second Life, I have seen people’s names diminishing rapidly. At one time people seemed to address another person by the first three letters of their first name. Now, they just address them by their first initial.
My nom de plume is DL Bach. I am also known by other names. My real first name is Debbie. Sam is a nickname given to me by others I worked with because there were three women named Debbie in our group of ten. In Second Life I am Parker. A friend in Paris did a play on my pen name and calls me DeeEl. I like this.
Debbie is a shortened version of my real name Deborah. If you really don’t like me and want me out of your life, just call me Deborah. I will be gone faster than you can repeat it.
There is one person I know in Second Life who has given to call me JJ. Now, my last name in Second Life begins with J, but for the life of me I cannot understand why this person calls me JJ even though I have corrected them several times. I generally use a person’s full first name in Second Life to address them, unless they ask me specifically not to.
There are times when nicknames (usually shortened versions of a given name) are used to be endearing. For instance, my Second Life name is Parker and most people call me Parky. This isn’t much shorter, but it is fun and playful. Then there are the nicknames that have nothing to do with a person’s name at all, such as my nickname of Sam or when people call a loved one Boo or Woobie, etc.
A while back (when I used to work), I was screening a movie or something and two men were discussing nicknames. One was Russian and the other American. The American asked the Russian if names didn’t work the same way in Russia being that you shorten them when speaking to or about a loved one. The Russian replied that occasionally it does work that way, but usually the nicknames are longer for someone you love. His rationale was that when you are saying the name of someone you love, you never want it to end. This is where I am.
In real life when I am introduced to someone, the manner of introduction will usually dictate how I address the person. Until I am invited otherwise, I will usually address them as Mr./Ms. So-and-so. I hold to the old way of respecting people. I do not infer intimacy, I wait to be invited in. When I worked in the prison, my first day of training, I met the head of the prison and when he introduced himself and we were chatting he asked me to call him by his first name. My manager, later, tried to write me up for insubordination for calling the director by his first name. The director chastised the manager instead.
When you are invited to the inner intimacy of speaking on first name basis, it is a trust that has been earned, not invaded. This is a matter of respect. So if you think so little of me and the speaking of my name repulses you so much that you reduce me to a mere letter of the alphabet, then I must reconsider the intimacy I have allowed you to share.


