When I was in 7th grade, I was inducted into National Junior Honor Society. Before the induction, we were asked if there was something wrong with the way our name was printed on the program. I raised my hand and asked if mine could be changed from Ellen to Emma. The advisor then asked what name was on my birth certificate, and I regrettably said Ellen, to which she replied "Well then that's what is going to be announced".
When I was in high school, I was known for my last name before I was known for myself. It was "Oh you're Tony's sister" this, and "Oh you're Chris's daughter" that. I had teachers that knew me as Emma personally and when I was in their class and they saw Ellen they had no idea it was me. However, in high school, I realized that it was necessary to use Ellen more often for the more official things in my life: driver's license, induction into national honor society, standardized tests, graduation, and college applications.
The funny thing about college applications though is that I'd have colleges sending mail to both Ellen and Emma trying to get me to apply. For a time I wanted to apply under both Ellen and Emma to see if one would get in over the other, but then I realized that only Ellen had taken the SAT/ACT and only Ellen had a high school transcript.
When I first got to Ball State I seriously contemplated dropping Emma altogether, and just go by Ellen to make introductions easier. The school only knew me as Ellen, and I had no relatives or previous relationships with anyone to instigate Emma to come out. However it only took 48 hours for me to grow tired of people trying to get my attention by calling me Ellen and failing miserably because I wasn't used to peers calling me that name. Yes by day 2 freshman year I reverted back to Emma and spent the effort each year going up to professors each first day and introducing myself and saying I prefer to be called Emma when in class.
Once in college Ellen was never very far from me. Every job I applied for, every recognition I received, every organization I joined and every conference I attended started out with me being Ellen. Some transitioned over to Emma like my professors, but some always remained Ellen.
When I began teaching in college I had to get more background checks than I can remember. Every single one asked if I was known by any other name. I knew this was looking more for last name changes, but I always wondered if I should have put Emma as another name just because it is another name I go by. Granted, I have a clean record so it didn't matter. We were also educated on internet safety, making sure that 1) we don't post something we wouldn't want a school to see and 2) we make ourselves unfindable to our students. For most people, this meant just taking off their last name off of social media in order to be unsearchable by students. I wondered if just changing my first name to whichever one I don't use in the school would be enough.
Now I'm in adult world. I have my own apartment, loans and bills in my own name, and my own adult teaching job. It's been exactly a month and I've already run into problems with the whole Emma/Ellen thing. My apartment questioned some mail I got because it was addressed to Emma rather than Ellen (which is funny because when my roommate and I started looking for apartments and I referred to myself as Ellen and she's known me since first grade as Emma so it threw her through a loop). My school e-mail is under Ellen but I introduce myself as Emma, and typically don't give my last name in such an informal setting. But when I'm expecting e-mails from people, I wonder if they are searching the system for Emma instead of Ellen and not finding anyone, and then proceed to become entirely too confused for just a name.
It makes me wonder if it is worth it to try and go back to Ellen again. Obviously I wouldn't get my long time friends, coworkers, family, or boyfriend to switch over, but maybe professionally introducing myself as Ellen would solve a lot of issues.
...or it would just put me through an identity crisis. Who knows?
No comments:
Post a Comment