Monday, May 16, 2011

Living with an alias

Don't tell the feds, but I am using multiple names.

You know how sometimes you are filling out a form, and it asks for "aliases or other names you have used" and you sort of laugh and skip over it (unless of course you are living under an alias in which case, are you really going to answer honestly? I think not) (or uness you are an asshole who would put something like "Mike Hunt" and then laugh hysterically).

I have my real name - the one that is on my birth certificate.
I have my married name - from the ill-fated first marriage.
I have my married name - from my second (current and forever) marriage.
I have the name I use to write.
I have my derby name.
I have my derby nickname.
And all of these people get mail at my house.

I also answer to "Mommy" "Auntie" and all variations of "honey" "sweetie" "baby" "hotstuff" and "legs" (that's a long story).
I have been known to turn around if someone says "Bitch" but only to see who I'm going to be kicking later.

When I am out with my family, I have one name.
When I am out with the team, I have another name.
When a collection agent is calling, I'm not home. No matter which name they use.

But here's where it gets tricky:

Just the other day, two of the girls from the team were over, and another friend stopped by. I went to introduce them and honestly didn't know what to say. I froze.
Derby Nickname? Because that's how I refer to them.
Derby Name? Geez, that's kind of formal.
Real Name? Gosh....I don't know. Calling a derby girl by her real name is, well, personal. There are people on the team who I have literally never - ever - called by their given name. Sometimes I have to think for a second, to remember what their legal name is. And sometimes their legal name is so fucking far from who they are in my head, that even though I know their name, I can't bring myself to actually call them that.

It just doesn't fit.

I don't know if they go by that name in real life, because it is so far from fitting. Does anyone call them that but their grandmother? REALLY?

And I was so befuddled, that I actually forgot the name of the friend I was introducing to the girls. I just blurted out their derby nicknames - the names I have saved on my phone, the names I use to refer to them in everyday conversation, their names - and then I stood there....frozen. Had I said the right thing? Had I just offended everyone in the room? Was that the wrong thing to do? Shit.

I had the same thing come up when I was introducing my parents to my teammates last month. I made an on-the-spot decision to introduce Hori Lori as Lori, because I didn't think my mother would be able to keep a straight face. Of course, she was so busy trying not to look at Noa's hotpants that she probably wouldn't have noticed.

(Cute boys in hotpants are very distracting.)

All this is to say that I am going to have some difficult decisions to make when I get my new driver's license, that's all.

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