I visited a shrink once. Or twice. Or for a year.
Her name was Julie Williams. She always told me to call her Julie, but I never could. Julie was a nice, social, "i'm a warm, fuzzy person" name. So I called her Williams. It seemed to fit better.
Shrinks always have those weird, strict, kind of names that you know when they were a kid their friends must've known that because they had that name, they would become like a doctor, or a lawyer, or a shrink. Names like Mildred, Victoria, Minerva, Gretchen, etc.
I have a friend with a name like that. Her name is Veronica. Isn't that such a "I'm going to be someone with prestige when I grow up" name? Like "I'm gonna get straight A's and be your boss" type of name?
I think it is. But she's done a pretty good job of screwing up her life so far. I told Williams once that she and Veronica should trade names. She asked why, and I told her.
Then she scribbled on her yellow notepad and asked me some questions.
I wonder what I'd be like if I had a Pretigious Name. Would I actually feel the need to exercise and stop eating and do my homework to the best of my ability? Would I be preparing to qualify for scholorships to fancy colleges?
I dunno.
We had a conversation the other day, about names. It was me, Parker, and Veronica in english class. I told Parker he looked like a Scotty. Or a Dundee.
He tried to insult me by coming up with a different name for me. He couldn't. As Veronica said, I totally define the name of 'Amanda' by existing the way I do. I'm just me. She said she couldn't label me or rename me because then I'd be a poser because I'm Amanda and there's no other way to describe me.
I was like, "I hate my name."
I do. I really do. I hate the harsh sounds of the consonents threading between the soft sounds of the vowels. I hate how it makes me sound like a strong, sturdy, defined person. I'm not. I wish my name were like 'Rosie' or 'Melody' or something silly like that, so people wouldn't expect so much of me. I was named after my great-grandma, who also played piano. So immediately when I started banging on a keyboard at the age of two, I was expected to become a great pianist. It's kind of annoying.
Anyway, so Parker and I were trying to rename Veronica.
I mentioned the name 'Julie'. And then some weird sort of hysterical laughter went off inside of me. I thought it was so perfect for Veronica: it was a flexible, bendy sort of name where you could screw up and then try again and nobody would think less of you because hey, your name is Julie. Veronica is a name that comes full and ready with strict guidelines and places with red tape everywhere, and you have to stand perfectly still for fear that if you put one toe out of line, you'll be damned forever.
Veronica is damned forever.
I think my name is so weird: Amanda. A-Man-Duh. Or, if you're Jamaican: A-mon-duh. It doesn't even come with a decent nickname. Sure there's 'Mandy', but whenever people call me that I feel like I'm three again.
On the other hand, being three wasn't half bad.
Then again, I guess normal people don't spend a good amount of time contemplating on the meaning of names. They probably just pay someone else to do it.
Or they just don't do it at all.