What's in a name?

What's in a name? Alot. It is what we identify ourselves with, even if we were given the original by our parents. I've changed my name so often over the years, that even I wonder what I prefer to be called. It started way back in first grade, when the teacher insisted on calling me Katherine, although everyone else called me Kathy. Not yet being able to read, how was I supposed to know that the way I was spelling my name, with the "e" sound and the "e" letter at the end, was not my nickname, but my full name? I've always suspected one of my older siblings had shown me how to write those letters and was enjoying a laugh at my expense. At some point in elementary school I got that straightened out, only to decide in the fourth grade I wanted to be known as Katie. That worked out for a year, but then I just HAD to be Kathy again, and my friends graciously switched back to my former moniker. There was a long stretch, all the way through high school where I was content to stay with Kathy (except for one sweet soul who called me Katie until we graduated, and if I ever see her again, she probably still would!), but the going got tough at the end. One of my brothers married when I was in the eleventh grade, and his bride's name was Cathy, which would not have been a problem except that the young couple also lived with my parents as I did. My friends were somewhat confused when they called our house and were suddenly asked which Kathy they would like to speak to. It got worse -- when they were expecting their first child, the rumors were flying in our town that Kathy U. was pregnant, which was true, but not really -- it was the other Cathy U., the one who didn't spell the name right, that was going to have a baby, but try telling that to the school gossips.

Having been somewhat traumatized by this experience, I decided to go with my full name in college. Few people would know me from my former life, as I was going away to college, so this seemed a reasonable thing to do. As luck would have it, the woman picked to be my new roommate was also a Kathryn, so for my own sanity I held on to Kathy, along with seemingly dozens of other freshman at the college. It was a turbulent 4 years, one of which was spent in Germany on a Junior Year Abroad Program, and the friendship I already had with a certain young German man turned into much more and we married a few months after I graduated. Being a pretty traditional kind of person, and desperately wanting to move up in the alphabet, I took his last name and replaced my middle name with my maiden name, naively assuming that once I got all the official paperwork taken care of, this would be the name I used for the rest of my life.

It turns out not every country works with this system. We moved to Germany a year after our wedding and suddenly I had my former middle name back and my maiden name was only an addendum, though not by my choice. Germans are very particular about names (before naming a baby, parents have to run the choice by some government agency, I kid you not) and any first and middle names which appear on your birth certificate stay with you for life, at least on paper. So now I have the dubious honor of having two official names: the American one on my U.S. passport and the one the Germans have decided is correct, and never the twain shall meet. The Germans still insist I sign First, Middle, Last and I just as stubbornly maintain First, Maiden, Last so that I literally have had to present official paperwork as to why my signature is different on various forms.

Aside from the redtape, it really makes no huge difference in my life how my official name is recorded, but what I am actually called is a whole nother matter. Knowing Germans have a hard time with the "th" sound, and not particularly caring for "Kessy" as so many people called me when I was on the student exchange, I had the brillant idea of tweaking my name when we moved so that it sounded at least close to the real thing. Out of Katherine, I made Kathrin. Voilà, once again a new name. For many years the people at church and the local bookstore where I had a part-time job knew me only as Kathrin. These were places where I was on my own, and if I said my name was Kathrin, that is what people called me. With the increase of internet usage and yes, Facebook (where I am back to being Kathy so friends in the States can find me), my email address and FB page are confusing to those who know me as Kathrin. Once again the distorted versions from Kaaty to Ketty and the everpresent Kessy make me envy my husband, who has been known by the same first and last name all his life, on paper and in speaking.

These days I just sign everything K.