an Alex by any other name

A piece over at Jezebel this week on names a guy should never call you (personally nothing gets to me other than any variation on “crazy” a favourite of the ex Mr. TheOdd), as well as the fact that a large number of people have been calling me Miss O’____ all week (name change official – hurrah!) got me thinking about the matter of names, how we refer to ourselves and others. This is kind of an entry about the ex Mr. TheOdd also, as he had quite a large influence on me as far as names go.

My nicknames past and present

I have an inherently shortenable name. Alexandra, it turns out, is absolutely replete with possibilities for, how shall I put it? “Mangling”. I will state for the record, right here and right now, that I love the name Alex. I love that it’s unisex, disyllabic and has an Xtra Kool X at the end. Plus: there are hundreds of us, it works fine for a kid and a grownup alike and nobody spells it wrongly. Unlike….

Lecky

Nobody calls me this any more. And by “nobody” I of course mean “both my parents as well as my friends from high school” if I had my way it truly would be nobody. The people who do call me Lecky (a name that makes me cringe) are militant about it and point blank refuse to call me anything else, unless it comes with air quotes. They will sometimes shorten it to Lex though.

I was given the nickname after an ex (ie. current) girlfriend of my Father’s. He’d already decided, pre-conception, that I would be called Alexandra (and incidentally, would be female) and as soon as I was born he named me “Lecky” which stuck… and is yet another reason I hate the man.

I mean seriously.

There are some members of my family (and I’m talking close relatives) who, after twenty two years, still cannot spell this particular nickname. There are far more wrong spellings of it than I would have ever thought possible. Also, people use it on cheques. Not too bright as all my accounts are under my full name.

I kept the name all throughout elementary and high school (as well as a wide array of bizarre lengthenings including, but not limited to: Leckifer, Elecebeth, Leckyzandra, Lecticia, Lectoria oh and Leckerbocerglory. My friends are odd, this I know. One still insists on lengthening my name out, at the moment I’m Lexagonal, Lexophagus or Lexonical depending on her mood). It was University when I finally managed to shake it off and moved full time into…

Lex

My Father’s second wife Carolyn named me Lex because she, like any right thinking and sane person, hated the name Lecky. Of course originally it was “Lex Luthor” but let’s skip over that. Most people shorten Lecky to Lex now if they still call me that.

When I got to university I introduced myself to people as Lex, having never ever been called Alex by anyone it would have felt weird changing completely, and so that’s how anyone I met in my first few weeks of Uni knows me. I say “my first few weeks” because anyone I met after the ex Mr. TheOdd knows me as Alex. See below for the reasons why.

There is one notable exception to the rule though and that is my Biologist friends: My ex flatmate S calls me Lex despite having met me at the very end of First Year, all her friends call me Lex too because she is a vile harpy who has no respect for me or how I wish to be known. I’m kidding. Mostly. Although even if I do introduce myself to someone completely new while she’s around she will immediately jump into the conversation and correct me, invariably they end up calling me Lex too and I die a little inside. Her reasoning is as follows: there are four other Alexes in that particular group and it gets confusing. That’s the extent of it, I’d complain but she’s surprisingly determined on this matter.

Other than introductions sabotaged by S, everybody now calls me…

Alex

Before University I had one Physics teacher and three P.E teachers that called me Alex. Mainly because they hated me. But other than that I had never been known as Alex before. Upon meeting the ex Mr. TheOdd on the first afternoon of University I, of course, introduced myself to him as Lex. He, in turn, looked at me, frowned and replied “I’m going to call you Alex” and it stuck.

I confess that I had always wanted to be an Alex, but changing your name in high school is nigh on impossible and I’d always had a sneaking feeling that I wasn’t “cool” enough to be one (yeah… maybe we should skip over my past self worth issues). It turns out that one person (granted with the charisma of about twenty – the ex Mr. TheOdd was damned charming) using it stopped me from feeling like I was playing pretend and made me able to actually own the name I was born with. I know it’s terrible to be pleased at someone deciding they hate your name and hence rechristening you but I still can’t help it.

Lexie

Two people have called me Lexie in my time. One was my first Mr TheOdd, D, and the other is my amazing name lengthening friend from a couple of paragraphs up.

Anyone even considering calling me this now is liable to get one of the following ripped from their body: right eye, throat, spleen, spinal cord. Their choice of course. As the ex Mr TheOdd said (sorry this entry is rather “him heavy”) “It sounds like you should be entered in Crufts” and loathe as I am to say it: I agree with him.

Pet Names

This section goes some way to explain why the “names guys should never call you” thing got me thinking as most of the pet names I’ve ever had have just seemed slightly… off.

The ex Mr. TheOdd had a rather interesting take on pet names – he started off with the cutesy diminutives but about a year into our relationship he pretty much liked to call me things specifically to piss me off, getting slightly better once I resigned myself to it and played along. I started out as Pumpkin or Cherub (excuse me while I go and throw up, back in a sec) and then moved on to… Worm.

Does anyone else think that’s kind of offensive? I mean, it’s not just me right? It was said in an affectionate way and everything but my attempts at explanation as to why it bothered me were brushed off with the statement that I was a “crazy lady”…

That name stuck with me for a year and a fucking half.

Worm eventually became “bee” (along with the notion that I could literally fly and was fuzzy with black and yellow stripes… this man is currently doing a PhD in cancer research – I weep for humanity) which in turn led to “bug” a name I have it on good authority that he now uses for his new torture victim (or should that be “girlfriend”?). I don’t know about you guys but finding out that the fairly unusual pet name my new guy is using for me once belonged to a former beau would leave one hell of a sour taste in my mouth…


And that’s me, and all my incarnations in a nutshell. I confess that I act differently depending on what name people use for me – perhaps it’s something to do with the expectations tied to me from the period of time when that name was used, perhaps it’s something more elemental than that. But there we have it.

Oh, and my next entry is going to be about shoes (more ex Mr. TheOdd ranting there too unfortunately, it’s all tied in with a pair of black stilettos you see…)