Wednesday 19 November 2014

What’s in a a Name?




Michigan Ralph Phillips. Mitch hated those three names more than anything else in the world. 3 names, 6 syllables, utter despair. Every since he was old enough to comprehend that those three words defined him as a human, he'd wished his parents had picked another 6 syllables. What were they thinking of naming him after a US state? They may as well have just sent him to school with a sign saying please bully our boy. And Ralph, he was named after Ralph Mctell cos his mum liked that nice Streets of London song. But Ralph really? It wasn’t so bad but it meant he couldn’t even drop the first name and go with the second one. To make matters worse his mum routinely called him by all three names, Michigan Ralph Phillips so there was no hiding his ridiculous name.
He was teased mercilessly in school, if the bullies weren’t mimicking his mum they were calling him Detroit, or Lake.
He tried all sorts of nicknames for himself, MR P was his first idea. He liked it but it never caught on. Then he went with Motown but no one was having that, so finally he settle on Mitch but even that backfired when one of his teachers misheard I’m Mitch and asked him where the itch was? Before adding well don’t scratch it boy, you’ll only make it worse
Mitch had been hell bent on changing his name for years. He’d promised himself that as soon as he was old enough he’d do it. But one thing or another had got in his way so it had taken him to his 40th birthday to get round to doing the deed. The problem was, as it had always been, what to change it too? He’d liked several names along the way but had since met people with those names and immediately gone off them. There was Paul, he liked Paul, it sounded honest, hardworking but then Debbie left him for a Paul and that ruined that. He wondered about Richard but then remembered a Richard who had routinely beaten him up in school. Then he considered Ian before being told that Jennifer, who was the love of his life for 9 years, had recently married an Ian. How creepy would that look?
He looked in the mirror and wondered what he looked like. He liked Josh, Luke and Jake, but he was 40 not 14, they were names that just didn’t suit a 40 year old. He’d thought about Theo, it sounded intelligent but he just didn’t see himself as a Theo.

He looked at the form that he’d printed off. He’d filled it all in apart from one line, the most important one of all. The clock was ticking, the registrar would see him at 3 and it was now 2.57. He had to make a decision. He picked up his pen and wrote 3 names. 3 names, 6 syllables. Then he scrumpled up the piece of paper, threw it in the general direction of the bin and left the registrar’s waiting room resigned to the fact he’d always be Michigan Ralph Phillips.

For part two click here

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