Pumpkin, Pooh Bear & Bean Toes: in which Jules reflects on nicknames

My nephew, who just turned three, came to visit recently.  I should clarify that he didn’t exactly drive the SUV here himself—his mom (my sister) and Dad came along, too—but given how bloody smart he is, I think it’s only a matter of time before we’ll need to hide the car keys from him. For instance, he takes better digital photos than I do—he gets everyone all lined up and centered in the shot, and then clicks with his teeny tiny fingers. He likes to reset clocks. (Though he’s quite a bit shorter than the counter where my haunted radio sits, so we all pretty much agree he couldn’t have possibly seen it, let alone set it, and he was never alone in the kitchen because that’s where the sharp objects live in my house.) I’ve mentioned before that he likes to get on the computer and IM. He’s also possibly the most adorable child ever born (well, along with yours, of course), and I’m not just saying that.  His eyelashes are like a foot long. Everyone who looks at him dissolves into a puddle of goo.

But it’s really kind of a miracle that the kid actually knows his name, because it occurred to me that I rarely used it when he was here. Instead he got called “peanut” or “sweet pea” or “pumpkin” or “Pooh Bear” or you name it because, look at him—how can you not call him those things? He cracks me up, too, because when he really wants to get his Mom’s attention, he says, “Honey! Honey!” very urgently, instead of “Mom.”  He probably thinks his mom’s other name is Honey.

         All this got me thinking about endearments, and nicknames. Anyone who’s known me for more than about a decade calls me Jules. Or Jewels. Choose your spelling. The high-school-and- earlier friends usually opt for the “Jules” spelling, but I see numerous and creative variations on the front of my Christmas cards when they arrive. Sometimes I hear “Jul,” but that’s mostly from my friend Kevin.  In short, I hardly ever hear my full name anymore from my adult friends. LOL. When I was growing up, there was “JuJu,” used primarily by my mom, perhaps most famously at Capwell’s department store when I was just out of high school. The precise moment is seared upon my memory—my mom singing out from the far end of the lingerie department: “JuJu! What’s your cup size now?!” Then me looking across to see her holding aloft a sturdy beige brassiere with what appeared to be steel girders embedded in the cups. A good dozen or so people in the vicinity furtively moved their eyes from the bra, to my bosom, back to the bra, assessing, because I guess it was impossible not to. Good lord. (I was much more easily mortified back then.)

The genesis of nicknames is sometimes obvious, and sometimes c omplex, and sometimes unrepeatable. For instance, when I was growing up, I hung out with a big pack of friends, both boys and girls, and one of them was named Scott O’Neal, whom we always called “O.” Easy to figure out how that one came about, right?  Then there’s my friend Marbs. That one’s a little more intricate. Somehow—I forget how or why, but I do know it began in high school (a good long time ago now)—we started calling her Marbles Figlips. (Her real name is Marla Phillips).  So she became Marbles for a time. Then Figs. Then the two became interchangeable. Over the years the nickname sort of settled into the breezy “Marbs,” still in use today (at least by me).

And then there’s the arcane nickname “Wipe,” which was shared by Greg and Mark in our little group of friends. The origins of that nickname were a ferociously guarded secret—they never would tell us how it came about, as apparently the truth was simply too ghastly (but allegedly hilarious…to them) to repeat  (and knowing them, I believe it)— but it stuck, so we had two Wipes in our gang. They even called each other Wipe. So on any given weekend night, the answer to the question, “Who’s going to that party?” might have been something like, “Jules, Marbs, O, Wipe, Wipe and Deano.”

Then there are the nicknames we give to our pets. My cat is named Domenic, but you’d hardly know it. On any given day he might be Dommie, or Dommie Salami. Or Peapod, a nickname leftover from when he was half of a set of twin kitties (they were like two peas in a pod, so somehow I ended up calling them Peapods.) Or Bean Toes. (What? His toes are pink. They look like little beans. Ergo, Bean Toes.) My neighbor once caught me calling Domenic "Huggy Pants," which was a little mortifying. And yes, he gets called Pooh Bear, too, because he’s orange.

Why do we do it, the whole nickname thing? Half the time, with my cat at least, I do it because it amuses me. But why do we give each other nicknames? Do you have one or more nicknames now, or did you have one or more growing up? How did you end up with those nicknames? How about your friends or loved ones or pets? (P.S. —I have a Myspace page which is still sort of work in progress, but here's the link if you want to be my Myspace friend: http://www.myspace.com/julieannelong).

Comments

[Ranurgis]

Well, a virgin blog unless someone else still beats me. I just got caught up on the March 1 blog and after I posted my second bit, I noticed that there was a new "title" available.

I really can't say much about nicknames. I think the only one I've ever had was what came out when I tried to say my name as a baby, something like "Eekn Dulz". The brother next to me called himself "Bippy" and from time to time he'll still reveal that or it comes up in his childhood stories.

For some reason, my parents were very strict about calling us by our given names and as a family we've stuck to that.

My sister's kids have shortened names: Ben for Benjamin, Nathan for Nathaniel, Matt for Matthew. The latter was a necessity because in his class there were no fewer than 5 Matthews. My niece Kathryn tried to become Kathy but it just didn't stick. Her son is Seth. However, I knew his father as Noah until my niece suddenly kept talking about taking Seth to see Dale.

Believe me, there were times in Canada when I seriously considered changing my name. My one sister-in-law did. Her license bears her legal anglicized name "Catherine" from the Dutch "Katrina" or "Catrina" (I'm not sure which). I was always confused when I'd get mail from Catherine Schulz when I know her as Rita. Actually, my first brother "Bippy's" real name is Wilfried. For obvious reasons, he shortened it to Wilf. After all he didn't fry anything. (Probably Mear can tell us what Friede means. Maybe others too.)

Of course, the little ones get called "sweetie", "sweetheart", "pumpkin", etc. too but by school age they usually answer to their real names.

[Julie Anne Long]

Man, Ranurgis, if my brother's nickame was Bippy, I wouldn't be able to resist calling him that for the rest of his life. LOL!! And I didn't know Rita was a nickname for Catrina! (Which is a pretty name). Wilf or Wil seem like good nicknames for Wilfried. I've had friends go back to using their full names when they're adults -- no more Timmy or Cindy, stuff like that. Wilfried is rather dignified-sounding. :)

It's kind of funny when people try to give THEMSELVES nicknames, and their friends refuse to use them. I heard of a guy who woke up one day and wanted to be called Stag, but no one would go for it. LOL. I think his name was Bob.

[Kathy K]

My favourite nickname is Kath and whenever anyone calls me Kath, I just kinda feel warm all over.
My parents would use it once in awhile, which is probably where the association came from...it's on the opposite end of the scale from "Katherine Lynn" when things weren't, um, happy? LOL
Usually I got the full name deal when I had done something wrong ~ of course ~ and Kath was when things were really good.

My best friend, whom I've known since grade 3 (geez, that's 40 years now...GACK!) uses my nickname the most, followed by my DH.

And it's funny; although I grew up with my parents calling each other 'darling' it's not a word that I can use...and I don't know why, but I am really uncomfortable using it, always.

For my husband, I use the other *traditional* ToE (aka Terms of Endearment); sweetie, sweetheart, honey...also goof ('cause sometimes he *Really* is) and doofus; this is the man that thinks puns are the epitome of humour...and my kids think he's usually the funniest thing going. *smacks forehead*
I of course do not share in the ability to be funny ~ at least in their eyes. *sigh*

When I was in school, mostly elementary, there were a few other nicknames, usually based on my then-last name, Jette (long e at the end); jette-spaghetti was the most common ~ kids have so little imagination sometimes; but it was alright 'cause I liked spaghetti!!

As for nicknames that I use; for my kids it was mostly 'punkin', although my oldest daughter really objected when I'd call anyone else that...that was *her* nickname. But I'm also pretty big on 'brat', 'hun', 'honey' and 'sweetie'; our dog gets 'dillysog' (aka silly dog) and just about anything else; my oldest daughter, again, calls *him* 'princess' but I've never really figured that one out and she's never been able to really explain it...so go the inner workings of offspring.

Nicknames are a whole other world in a way and it's interesting what people use for those that they're close to...

And Julie, Sam is adorable!! You're right to gloat. *grin*

[Julie Anne Long]

YOu SOUND like a Kath, Kathy!! LOL. Yeah, I got "middle named" when I was naughty, or when I was goofy. Does it feel weird when people who don't know you very well call you Kath?? I once had a boss (someone I wasn't crazy about) call me "Jewels." That felt odd. Very jarring. And it's funny...I wonder what triggers the nickname phase of a relationship?? Or makes it seem OK??

Jette is a cool last name!! It's French for "jump" or "leap" isn't it?? (when pronounced JETtay). Kids just LOOOOVE the rhyming thing. Fortunately, not a heckuva lot rhymed with Julie, apart from Tule (the stuff Indians used to make baskets, I believe), which wasn't funny enough. It took someone YEARS to figure out Droolie also rhymes with Julie. LOL. Long, however, became SHORT a lot of the time. My P.E. coaches always called me Julie Short (because I was tall).

"Darling" *is* rather formal. Sorta lends itself to an ironic intonation. LOL. I tend to default to "sweetie" for whatever reason when it comes to significant others. With friends, these days, it's often "toots" or "doll" or "cookie." LOL. Dont' ask me why. I seem to go through phases.

It's funny how often we tell our pets they're silly. Domenic gets "silly cat!" A lot of the time, too. He seems to really enjoy it.

Man, it is SPRING here!! The air smells heavenly, and it's warm but not too warm, and it's brilliantly sunny. La la la! LOL. How are you all doing snow-wise up north??

[meardaba]

"friede" means tranquility, or quiet, and it usually has to do with (as far as I can tell) the dead. For a long time I thought it meant graveyard!

My name does not lend itself to nicknames, except for the one I use as a screename. But my little sister's does! Actually, for the first 4 years of her life she was called Gonzo, because when she was born we couldn't remember her real name and all we knew was that it had a Z in it. (Her name's Zoe). She's got Zozey, Zozer, Zo, Zozer-Pozer, etc. My older brother's name is Koan, and so we used to call him Ko-Ko, though not after the gorilla. But had we known about the gorilla, we would have capitalized on it, you can be sure. My older's sister's name also didn't lend itself to nicknames.

As for my cat...well, we named him Shakespeare, which just begs for shortenings. Especially when we were feeling particularly loving. He got Shakey, Shakes, Kitty, Stinky, Stinky Breath, Smelly Face, Puss in Boots (he had little white booties on his feet), Bag of Bones, Furbag, etc. You know, all the lovey-dovey stuff. :D

[Angel]

Hi Julie! I'm a very new reader to your books (well, I've only just finished "The Runaway Duke" very early this morning) and having enjoyed the read immensely, I just had to check if you have a website (you do!). And then I just had to check if you have a blog (score!), and then of course, I just had to introduce myself.

My name is Angel (a nickname for Angelie). I have, let's see, five other official nicknames. They are as follows:
1) Ginggay ("jing-guy") - used by family and pre-college friends. I have no idea where the name came from.
2) Ging - used only by my mom and my eldest sister.
3) Jennifer - nickname of choice by my brother. He just likes the name, is all.
4) Jen - used by my immediate family, and a derivative of Jennifer, which is NOT my name.
5) Fer - used solely by my bestfriend Joan. Again, from JenniFER. To reciprocate, I call her Joaniefer, ha!

I'm originally from the Philippines, and there, nicknames run the gamut from meaningful mini-names to out-of-this-world monikers. My male cousin, for example, is called Bimbo. I have friends named Tin-Tin, Tan-Tan, Bong-Bong and Bing-Bing (oh yes, we're very big on repetitions). There's also the soundbased names like Ding-Dong and Lala. We also go overboard with spellings btw. Thus: Jhay-Ar, Myrah, Jhoel, and Biancah - the letter H is very close to our hearts, apparently. Then there's the fruit-pie combination, like Orange Pie and Peach Pie. Orange happens to be my friend, and Peach is her sister (honest!). Now what else...oh, we don't mind giving our nicknames to our pets. I grew up with a dog also nicknamed Ginggay. It got very confusing when my mom called and we were both around. Eventually I decided, when in trouble, assume mom was calling the dog. Worked like a charm.

[Julie Anne Long]

So Wilfried means "Wilquiet?" Or "WilTRANQUIL," Mear? Is Bippy at all tranquil in real life, Ranurgis?

And boy, you lucked out Mear -- getting a sibling with a "z" name. It's really fun to mess with Z's! :) And Ko-Ko is GREAT for a brother. Calling an older brother Ko-Ko is a great way to keep him humble. :) I know -- my sister's name is Karen, and apart from Kar, or Kari, she doesn't really have a nickname. I call her Karen. Or schnooks. Or whatever. LOL.

I just had to go take Bean Toes outside for his walk. I actually call him Cubby a lot, too (the Winnie the Pooh song goes, "Chubby little cubby all stuffed with fluff..." Stinky breath! What ARE you feeding that cat, Mear? (To paraphrase the infamous "Smelly Cat" of Friends fame.)

Hi Angel!! Welcome to the blog! Glad you could find us. We can usually keep a topic meandering for, oh, about a good week or so. LOL. And I'm so glad you enjoyed DUKE! I really hope it kept you awake. :) (I LOVE it when a book keeps from from going to sleep because I just can't stop reading.)

And you're cracking me up with your nicknames. It kind of sounds like eople like to mess with the letters in your name (Angelie is such a pretty name -- I might need to use it in a book. :) ), which sounds like how you ended up with Ginggay. That's the only theory I can come up with, anyhow. Or does Ginggay mean something specific?? I particularly like how your brother just gave you a whole other name. LOL! Pretty funny! And how VERY like a brother to do something like that. I had a friend named Josh -- it said exactly that on his birth certificate, just Josh -- so of course I always called him "Shua," because that was the missing last part of his name.

I'm thinking of your party role call:
Q: "So who's going to the party this weekend?"
A: "Oh, Tin-Tin, Tan-Tan, Bong-Bong and Bing-Bing, Ding-Dong and Lala."

I'm jealous MY friends don't have nicknames like that!! LOL. Maybe i'll just have to re-christen someone for the heck of it.

The "fruit pie" phenomenon is interesting, too. I once had a friend who added the word "head" after everyone's name to make a nickname. Hence, I became Julie-head, and you would have been Angel-head, we would have had Kathy-head, Ranurgis-head, Mear-Head, and etc. Are Orange and Peach your friend's REAL names?? I once knew a woman named Apple. Long before Gwyneth Paltrow named her baby that. :) But we didn't call her Apple Pie. :)

I also had a friend whose dogs were named Pam and Randy...and there were also a brother and sister at our school, and in her church group, called Pam and Randy. LOL. Pretty funny.

[Diana]

Julie, your nephew is super adorable. Love his sunglasses. :)

I've never had a nickname. I don't like the shortened version of Diana, Di, and am glad people don't call me that. Once in a while, my friends will jokingly call me DD (or however you choose to spell it). The thing that bugs me is when people call me Diane. Maybe I need to enunciate more when introducing myself, but yeah, that annoys me.

I used to work with third graders and rarely used terms of endearment when addressing them, but now that I work with four- and five-year-olds, "sweetie" is a regularly-used word in my vocabulary.

I'm absolutely loving the weather we've been having. Today during my lunch break I didn't even wear my warm winter coat.

[Lareign]

Nicknames are fascinating. My name doesn't lend itself to a lot of obvious nicknames, at least. It lends itself to song, however "The rain in spain falls mainly on Lareign" ha. But my family always called me Raney, which I don't mind coming from some people as a term of endearment. But generally only family. I have one friend who calls me Lala, which is nice (then again, so did an ex). Another friend calls me Larry, I think as part of a long-ago inside joke. Her name is Heather, so I call her Heater. Probably my best friend usually calls me Lareign, ha. I call him Ben, since that's his name.

My whole family has weird names, except my dad. My mom is Latrell, so people call her Trell. My brother is Channing, and people generally call him that, ha. He swears one of his friend's moms called him Chan Ling, but I'm not so sure. For awhile he got called Bubba, but that had to be stopped, for obvious reasons. Chanalug is the weirdest one I can think of.

While we're on the subject of MySpace, I wrote a story on an interesting thing our local police department is doing. Rather than link to my story, I'll link to the Web page they made for a serial bank robber. It's great fun, ha. It's gotten picked up all over the world in places like Australia and Germany. Not my story, usually the AP one or a TV one, but it's still fun. http://www.myspace.com/bankrobber2007

Oh, on the subject of cats, it's nice to know I'm not the only one who talks to my cats. Lola becomes Lola-girl, Lola-Bell, sometimes just "little fat girl." Casey is Case, Mr. Orange Man, Orange Boy, etc. I also call them silly all the time. And I call them "toots," hah, which my friends seem to find hilarious. Like "Lola, you're such a silly toot." And I better stop before I tell too much, haha.

[Julie Anne Long]

Those shades ARE the coolest, aren't they, Diana?? LOL. He looks so darn cute in them. I was torn between using photos of him without them, with just his big blue eyes showing, and the ones with them, and opted for the "with them" photos. Odds are pretty good you'll see more photos of him in the days ahead, anyway. :)

So you don't have a nickname, huh? Can I call you ChaCha? Just kidding. How about BooBoo? No?? LOL. Sorry!! I know, it's strangely grating to hear your name mispronounced, I guess because we all identify so strongly with our names. I hear, "Judy, is it?" fairly frequently. Or "Julia." Then again, I have a little issue with talking a bit too fast. LOL. I get a lot of "Julie Anne's" these days, too, which is understandable, but "Anne" is most definitely a middle name. My friend Melisa (MELEESA) is forever having to correct the pronunciation of her name (she gets Melissa ALL THE TIME), but she claims it helped her be more outgoing.

You guys have cool names in your family, Lareign. I love how yours is spelled...it's almost...La Reine, which would be "The Queen" in French. As it is now, you have that very strong "reign" in there. :) Raney's a cute nickname, too. If my brother was named Channing, I would be tempted to call him ChanChan. I occasionally call my cat Bubba, for some reason. Bubba is one of those words that just slip out, I suppose. You can almost see how that sort of thing could happen. LOL.

I think we ALL say ridiculous things to our pets, because our pets seem to really enjoy it. My sister wins for the most embarrassing (and lengthy) pet nickname, however, I think. I dared her to post a comment about it. LOL. We'll see if she does.

And that's a marvelously inventive use of a MySpace page -- the bank robber story. And look how many friends "Do You Know Me?" has!! LOL!!

[Lois]

Alas, I can't add anything because I never had a nickname. Pooh. LOL I would have just been happy if people got my real name right half the time. :) I got plenty of different spellings of Lois in my time, including Louise, Louis, Luis (which I always thought was a guys name, but hey, what do I know?), and one guy who still lives a couple doors down when he was high would call me Laura. At least Luis is a little bit closer to Lois than Laura. LOL

Anyway, I would try to say, Lois, like Lois Lane. That worked quite well at the first author signing I attended last October in NJ. When I was a kid, apparently no one ever read comics or went to the movies because they still didn't know what I was talking about. And nope, I really didn't get any Superman jokes, except from the same guy a couple doors away when he did remember my name was Lois --"Hey Lois, where's Superman?" Needless to say, I prefered it when he was high. ;)

Lois, who also had plenty of variations of her last name too. Sigh.

[Julie Anne Long]

Lois, you reminded me of that Seinfeld episode -- Jerry is Superman-obsessed, and he meets a woman named Lois, and he's enthralled by her name. LOL. I think it was the one with Priscilla Presley?? So Lois is a grand name. :) Iconic, in fact. I wonder what its origins are? Is it in the Louisa/Louis family of names? Your "Laura" story reminded me of something...in my first year at a job I once had, one woman called me "Susan" for a year, and i was partially too amused, and partially too shy, to correct her. Somehow she figured it out. Do I look like a Susan?? In her mind, I suppose I did.

[Lois]

LOL Alas, no one has been fascinated about me only because of my name. . . thankfully. . . LOL I really don't know much about Lois, but in the little bit I've seen in those places that say what a name means, I never saw any reference to another name. You know, like when I looked up Lisa for my sis, that I do believe comes from Elizabeth, but nothing with Lois. But maybe sometime in the future I'll look deeper into it or something. :) However I was named after a relative. :)

But that's funny, the Susan story. . . but at least they weren't high for that year. LOL :) Somehow it makes it better, even if it was happening for a year. LOL :)

Lois

[Kathy K]

Yeah if someone that I didn't know really well used Kath, I'm not sure how I'd feel. It would really depend on how comfortable I was with the person. I'm usually pretty quick to know if someone is going to be a real friend, and in that case, okay. But if it's someone that I don't know, or don't particularly like, then it is kinda creepy.

As for middle-naming my kids when they did something...heheheh; our kids have TWO middle names each and I used them accordingly, so they knew that if I got all the way to Kozakewich they better run!! LOL

And you've got my maiden name just right! That's exactly how it used to be pronounced; two of my brothers use the Jetté spelling; why I don't really know 'cause neither of them speak any french: Funny guys.

And our weather is *very* spring-like; in fact we have lakes all over the roads because the snow is melting so fast and not really going anywhere.
The cars are a mess, so the car washes are doing a booming business. The warm weather is wonderful; but I really don't expect that it will last because it's only March here. We usually end up with one more winter-go-round once spring first hits.
That's alright, I know that the end is near {geez, now I'm sounding like a doomsdayer}.