Just Alex

Written by emma

The title of this website is Walk with me for a moment. I'll need you to do that as I go through a few things. In life currently, my name is Alex, but I will be very insistent, it is just Alex. Not Alexander. Not Al. Just Alex. The author of these blog posts is Emma. This is who I desire to be one day, she is the all of the good and sweet and kindheartedness of me that exists as a person. For now it isn't safe to be her in the physical space I occupy. So if we were to ever meet, I would insist. It is just Alex. If you were literally walking you can stop now. Unless you have somewhere to be, in which case stop staring at your phone while you're walking.

From a very young age I was very particular about my name. School enjoyed being proper and calling me Alexander, I hated it. It was to be stabbed in the chest to be called Alexander. But what do you do about it? It is your name after all, surely my mother knew what she was doing with names, and I'm far from a rule breaker so this isn't a time for me to stand up for myself. That's about how this keeps going too, despite years of folks calling me Al, or Alexander. Despite the internal pain it caused me to be called these names, I never really corrected anyone unless they were kind enough to ask first. This was always the best scenario, someone who knew enough to know I might prefer to be called something other than my full name. These people were heroes to me for such a simple act.

As a kid a neighbor called me "Alex Trebek" I guess when you like learning things as a child and your first name is Alex you get referred to as the late host from Jeopardy? I don't know, people rarely make sense and are weird. This was unacceptable to me too. It was just Alex, I was not the host of the game show my mom and grandma watched every night, I was just Alex.

I don't want to spin in circles too much about this, I think you get the point. The last one I will bring up is my mother, who routinely calls me Al. I'm an adult now, she has no idea I know I am a woman, and that I will one day be called Emma. But I let her call me Al, even though it drives me up a wall every time. I do this because enough things get in between me and my mother getting along already, and if I'm honest and looking at my family history, I've got about another 10-12 years of her doing it and then she won't be here anymore. If her calling me Al brings her some small bit of joy or she feels it does for me, I can live with it I guess. But that's how it has always been. I've just put up with this despite being so internally insistent about it. Through the years I have had highs and lows in my confidence. There were definitely times I've stood up for myself, and been an advocate for myself. But this period of time isn't that. This period of time is one of being who I am first and foremost, and despite for years me thinking it was just Alex. It wasn't even Alex in the first place. My partner, the only person in real life who knows about my identity, calls me Emma when it is just us. My heart lights up, my inner happiness is sky high, this is me, this is who I really am. Emma.

I think the point I want to make with all of this is that names are often rarely just names, for many if not all of us they are so much more than that. But I think sometimes we don't learn that lesson, and I think sometimes we don't teach it either. But should I run into you in real life, it is just Alex, until one day it doesn't have to be any more.

Later Gator