If I name myself, I recognize who I am. By recognizing who I am, I am becoming myself.
Robert Fripp
So, names.
Names are obviously extremely important. They help us identify objects, help us to categorise those objects, and so on. They also are part of our identity...they can delineate the changing of age group, from child to teen to adult, or label generations of you happen to be.
They help us know who we are, and become who we are meant to be.
I've known this for a long time...the Fripp quote above is one I've used time and time again on this subject. It came more strongly to my head today as I ran post work errands. My first stop was the grocery store, where I had to sign after ringing up the stuff I got, and where I get to use my name (since I have not legally changed my name yet, I'm often having to use my deadname). And it's written out all fluidly and nice and clear, with an extra second of care taken in signing.
Then I go to the bank to cash my paycheck, and my signature can best be equated to a 2 year old with a crayon. I honestly don't give a fig how it looks. And while I've realised for a long time how little I care for my deadname, it hit me that strongly that it's something I want less and less every day. And when baseline want is 0, well...we're hitting some serious negative integers.
When I was little, I already had issues with my name. I loved my dad and I loved my grandfather, but I was not like either of them. Nor was I like my mother, nor my eventual 'little' brother. Sensitive, reading, drawing, not liking roughhousing (that changed over the years in the right circumstances, speak no more say no less), and wanting to know when I'd start getting dresses and my long hair.
That obviously never happened.
Well, the long hair did, after much fighting. And I ended up losing it 3 or 4 times, but that's a tale for another night.
But speaking of nights...every night, before I fell asleep, I swore to myself that when I could, I was going to change my name. And I always had a particular first name in mind. It's pretty obvious, since it's in the name of the blog. But I wanted a Juliet, and as much as I love Shakespeare, I was afraid that'd be too cliché. So, loving French culture, Juliette seemed just peachy to me. Close friends knew me as Julie...the closest, the ones I trusted, were told about Juliette.
That left me with a middle name, and I went through dozens of permutations over the years, with none of them ever being right. Somewhere I have notebooks that'd look for all intents and purposes to be baby name books, with line after line of ideas and thoughts and scratched out names and so on. It was harder than knowing what first name I wanted...but t had to be right. It had to sound right. It had to feel right. It had to be me.
Finally, I came across Alexandria. And in conjunction with Juliette, it was like two puzzle pieces clicking together.
I was born.
And in naming myself, I began to know myself.
And in beginning to know myself, I started to become myself.
It made it easier to come out, to tell people. It made it easier to decide to be wholly honest with therapists, because I had to. It gives me a path forward I want to carry on with...because honestly, if I didn't follow my heart, I'd be dead. Becoming myself has allowed me to let people get closer to me, and the friends I have now are truer for it. Even the people who knew me in high school, now that we've reconnected, see a different, more honest, more open me, and are happier for it.
I'm happier for it.
Because I'm not pretending all the time to be someone I'm not.
I want...need...to do the legal name change. In NJ, it's expensive, and not a guarantee. All it takes is a judge to say no and I'm out several hundred dollars. That terrifies me, to be honest. But I kinda have to take the risk, you know.
Because Julie deserves a chance to BE, outwardly as well as inwardly.
And I deserve to give her that chance.
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