October 10, 2006

People Who Call Me Susan

There are three who get away with it.
Three people I know.

All others get corrected. Politely of course. No venom in my voice, no evil glare exposing the truly heinous nature of their offense.

Still. It's best to remember.
I prefer you remember.

My name is Suzanne.
Not Susan.

Richard is one. I've worked for and with him for nineteen years. He has called me Susan from day one. His business partner and employees get it right, but not Richard. Not verbally, not in writing. Susan it is and for some reason I don't mind.

Katie is another. She has cut my hair for... well... for a long time. I like that she always asks about The Boy and consistently gives a good haircut. I don't see her often these days, what with adopting the wild and crazy long grey curls I've been working on since last November. But when I stopped in last month, I smiled at her greeting: "Hello Susan! It's been awhile!" I don't even grit my teeth when Katie calls me Susan.

Anthony is the third. He's Bonnie's dad. They live directly behind us. We met them before we put up the privacy fence, otherwise he might still be a stranger. I don't have the foggiest idea why he thinks my name is Susan or if I've ever corrected him. Seems like more trouble than it's worth to do so. I just roll with it.

As for the rest of you, well, don't be stealing my "z".
Such deprivation should not be the norm in polite society.

.

20 comments:

Rainwolf said...

Someone called me Sarah for a few months before another friend corrected him. I liked the guy and didn't want to embarrass him so I let it go.

sporksforall said...

My family calls me Liz. No one else does except the custodian in my office. He also gives me a hard time daily for not generating more trash.

Z's are VERY important.

WenWhit said...

You didn't mention the mail we got from Anthony, addressed simply to Susan and Wendy. *sigh*

Anonymous said...

My best girlfriend is named Susan... she really HATES it when people call her "Sue"

Unknown said...

Hehehe great post SuZanne!!!

There are only a wee number of peeps who can call me the name variations that I am not terribly fond of...the first one almost makes me cringe...

My one older brother (I have not been able to break him damnit!!!) still calls me....Barbie...eeeeks!!! Worse yet...there are times he will call me...wait for it....Barbie-Anne....good grief...can we say...double eeeeeeeeeeeeks????

Then there was one dear friend in University who was the one and only one to call me Babs...and...coming from her...I did not mind it so much!

Anonymous said...

I have a similar problem...my name is DianA. Not Diane. Yet everyone drops the A. It drives me nuts!!!

Eyes for Lies said...

I try to call people by the name they give me. I don't shorten it -- unless they do :)

Blogrolling is down. I feel handicapped. You are easy to find. There is only one Suburbian Lesbian :)

Little Blue Petal said...

Hi Suzanne, I completely understand how you feel! My name is Davida, but for some reason people always shorten my name to Dav, Davi, Vi or Vida. They think they are being chummy-- but it does my head in! I'm going to have to start wearing a flipping name badge :)

LBPx

SassyFemme said...

With a name like mine there's not much that can be changed about it, but I absolutely hate when people think they're being cute and call me Annie... only Fran and her mom get to call me that!

Anonymous said...

You guys think you have it bad, my name is spelled Chava, but it should be pronounced 'Havah'. Not only that, but when telephone solicitors call, they think Chava is a man, and they ask if they can speak with "him". Sheesh.

Chava aka Patchwork Poet

Val said...

I correct with gritted teeth when people dare to call me Valerie. It's VAL. GOT IT???!! (I'm not yelling at you - just emphasizin'!)
Only my Mom gets to call me that and she doesn't very often (though she tells me how much she "loves the name and doesn't understand why I don't, blah blah blah..."!!!)
Anyway, you just seem and look like a Suzanne - so Suzanne it is -though I call you Suburban Lesbian - is that ok?!!! I keep all the letters....don't drop any... ok i'll shut up now!

maxine said...

When we were in Taos we were told Orlando's was a must. So there we went. There was a considerable wait and eb was in a teensy bit of a mood.

"We eat Mexican food all over houston. Good Mexican food. And we are on vacation and we're going to wait for Mexican food? Can it really be better and is it really not to be missed?"

I promptly reminded her that Ginger, who also eats good Mexican food all over Houston is the one who steered us there, and then I went to get her a beer for her wait.

While I was signing up for the wait list, there was not one, but two Maxine's already on the list. I gave them Elizabeth's name instead as there were none on the list already.

Beer drinking and waiting. A couple of tables were questionably seated before us and I was beginning to catch eb's mood a little. Then we almosty lost our table. We sat there watching the hostess try to find Liz.

Fucker.

KMae said...

Growing up in Texas, I was Kathymae, all one word. Of course I hated it & went to plain Kathy. Then in jr high they started calling me Broddie, Broddie Mae or Brod (part of my last name)... We all had nick names then.

Imagine my surprise when friends moved to NYC & still called me Kathymae. I noticed I was certainly the only one around on the East Coast called Kathymae. Everyone picked it up & thus KMae came out of it...

Anonymous said...

Hard to mess up a name like Bill.

weese said...

I have no name issues.
You can call me weese, you can call me lisa, you can call me lis.
you can call me susan if like.
tho i may not respond. then again... i may not respond to my name either.

chapin said...

Calling someone by their correct name is very important. It makes my skin crawl when I go see my Doctor and they call me by my "real" name. It makes me think I'm in trouble and my Mom is hollering for me.

At work no one uses my first name...only my last name. The problem with that is that hardly anyone says it correctly.

tiff said...

realname = Kerry

variations = Carrie, Keri, Kari, Carolyn (WTF?), and, of course, Karen (which is what my GRANDMOTHER called me)

My MIL calls me Kathy from time to time. I don't know why.

Anyhting other than Kerry irks me!

agoodlistener said...

You are so lucky to have a z in your name! I don't blame you for insisting that it be pronounced. Hmmm, maybe we should just call you "Z" and be done with it.

Sapphique said...

I have "esses" in my real name, that people frequently replace with "zee's"...we should switch off, Suzanne!

KMae said...

Cracking up at Weese & Tiff...
UH, I mean Lisa & Kerry.