What's in a Name?

 Several weeks ago as I sought direction for this shiny new blog of mine, I offered as an opening, “Ask me anything.” I shouldn’t be surprised that my name was at the root of most responses. 

Is Traveler your real name?  Why did you change it?

     In 1993 at the age of eighteen I petitioned the court for a legal change of name, which was granted. Forty dollars and a reason was all it took. My reasoning was simple enough on the surface; my given name didn’t suit me, and rarely was that name used to my benefit.

     Words are just words, simple tools of communication until they are used with the intent to harm. Just as a leather belt is only an object, a simple tool intended to hold up a pair of jeans until a more nefarious purpose is found.

     My given name was Traci. As far as names go, there is nothing wrong with it. It’s normal without being terribly common, borders on androgyny without crossing a line, and has no historical hero or villain for the current bearer of the name to live down or strive to emulate. Traci was a perfectly serviceable moniker until I was about five or six years old. That was about the time I began to seriously dislike my own name.

     Again, the word itself has nothing in it to offend. Rather my distaste had everything to do with how and why that name was used. I almost never heard “Traci” roll off the tongue with affection, fondness, respect, or even with a simple acknowledgement for the person it was intended to represent. Rather it was snapped, sneered, or served dripping derision. To hear my proper name was to be reminded that I was at fault. My performance was lacking. I had failed or simply been found wanting. My name was spoken in anger, disappointment, exasperation, irritation, irony, and often in dismissal. I learned to dread two syllables.

     Oh, but certainly I couldn’t have spent my entire childhood being a walking disaster? True, and that’s what nicknames were for. I was called things like Brat, Tweety, Turkey, and Kid. Among my friends were names like Spacey and T-Ray. Even the less-than-flattering nicknames that were meant to tease were spoken with more regard for my feelings than my given name ever was. I cringe to remember my Dad calling me “Shit-for-Brains” with a smile on his face or “Traci” with a look of abject hatred. 

     Somehow this phenomenon even translated to writing. Any pet name or title I was granted was treated as a proper noun whereas my own name would usually show up without capitalization. This is something that still bothers me. Whatever you name me, if the first character is in lower case, I will feel as though the word was printed with intent to harm. 

     In all fairness, I have never been an easy person to know. Inborn quirks in both personality and thought process, inherent social phobia, among other eccentricities make for unpredictability not conducive to success in society. Luckily I had been blessed with a small number of friends that managed to tolerate my weird into my late teens when something remarkable happened. 

     It was 1992 when I first walked through the gates of a Renaissance Festival and found my people. Within a couple of months I had expanded my network of friends to include men and women, and even children, of different cultures, backgrounds, races, religions, political leanings, and tax brackets. Out of the dust I was embraced by a subculture that allowed me to be different without being either sinister or pitiable. If ever I said or did anything unconventional I was encouraged to explore and expand on the idea instead of being arbitrarily shut down.

     That’s not to say that everything was suddenly perfect. Wherever humans gather there are always flaws and disagreements, struggles for dominance, and general discontent. But the real key was the almost universal respect for autonomy, and what a gift that can be to someone who had never really fit in anywhere, and so was continually pushed to conform.

     It was among these poets, dreamers, and philosophers that I was first called by the name of Traveler. The name wasn’t an accident. It was deliberate, and pronounced with meaning. How the name came to be mine is another story, and oddly one that isn’t mine to tell. What is important here is that the name was immediately and universally accepted as my very own proper noun. Traveler may seem like an odd thing to call a woman, but remarkably it is usable in every sense that most people take for granted in their own birth-name. More important to me is that this word has been used in every possible tone. I have gotten to experience this designation uttered with acceptance, love, respect, and best of all in friendship and simple human regard. It has been such a gift.

     Sometimes having an unusual name is inconvenient. People think they’ve misheard, or that I’ve mistakenly given my surname or the name of my company. Some people display their discomfort by making fun or refusing to call me by name. I have even had people who insisted on calling me Traci even after I explained that in doing so they were hurting me, or that I haven’t answered to my birth name in well over 20 years.

     It’s okay.  I know who I am.   

The confidence to say that makes a court fee the best forty dollars I have ever spent.