My Nicknames and Me

Write about a nickname you have been given in your life

I haven't written anything recently for the writing workshop. I have been so busy; what with the Gallery, My daily Blipfoto, various Meme's. This blogging community is a hive of activity! Then there is my non-virtual life. Work, kids etc plus the buying of a hamster (There is a whole blog about the emotional trauma one small hamster caused...more of that another day)

But the nickname theme is something I really want to blog about.

There is one thing I have to establish at the beginning of this:

I have dealt with this and moved on, but I will not reveal the name I was called. I haven't told my husband, so I won't be telling you.

People have tried to give me nicknames over the years, but they just didn't stick. For a while I was Ollie Onion (my surname was Oliver), I was also Pebbles from the Flintstones because of the way I wore my hair, my brother and I do still refer to each other as OIlie, which is a bit weird, and my Dad calls me pruneling, but other than that, no nicknames.

(I don't really see the likeness either - It's not like I had a bone hairband!)

But then, something happened - 'I got off with' (there's an expression that's a blast from the past) this bloke. He was the older brother of a friend of mine but things didn't go the way he had planned. So he told people all sorts of horribleness and came up with a name that stuck with me for the last three years I spent in the small town I grew up in. People would literally just shout this name at me randomly in the street. Even 'friends' used it to wind me up.  It disgusted me, it made me feel small and dirty. It was one of the many reasons I wanted to leave and live in a city where I could be anonymous. I didn't want to be me. 

I did move to the city, I reinvented myself but inside I stayed the same and I became tougher and stronger. Have I forgiven and forgotten? No. Would I tolerate this now. Never. Should it have happened in the first place, of course not. Can I change anything now. No. So I have moved on. 

I now use a nickname online that was given to me by a friend - MuddynoSugar is my poker name and how I like my coffee, it is a part of me and I love my online persona. It is everything a nickname should be.

I had a look to see where Nickname comes from - this is what I found:

Misdivision of ekename (1303), an eke name, literally "an additional name," from Old English eaca "an increase," related to eacian "to increase"

So MuddynoSugar increases me, it is another part of me, the me that people don't shout at in the street, the real me, Jane.