What's in a Nickname

Recently I've been thinking a lot about nicknames. My family has come up with some pretty creative names in the past. For example, my nickname as a child was Cinny (pronounced sin-e). I actually came to be known as this because as a little girl I was very tan. We spent a lot of time at the beach and I have the right skin tone to become very dark. My family began calling me Cinnamon stick. That was eventually shortened to just Cinnamon. My older brother Billy is only 20 months older than me, and so because he was young himself, he couldn't quite pronounce Cinnamon. It came out Cinny. My family thought it was cute and from then on that was what I was called. No one every called me Alexandra until I was probably in the 4th or 5th grade. Even know my family still calls me Cinny and I'm still charmed by it.

My younger brother Dana. Now that is a boy of a million names. When he was real little we called him Mista. Then Little Guy. In fact one year for Halloween he dressed up as a little man with a mustache and all, because then he'd fit his 'little guy' name. About the time he learned to walk he was called Angel Boy. His dad later had a store named after that nickname. By the age of three he graduated to Tres. At Four he was called Four. At five, Cinco. In all honesty I can't remember all the names he's had. Maybe my family can remember more and they'll help me out and I can come back and edit this posting.

But the nickname that really got this stirring was one I gave to my Nana's husband, Tom. Because our grandpa who we call Pa Bill is still alive, we never called Tom Grandpa, we always just called him Tom. One day while visiting them we were playing Lego's and goofing off and I started calling him Grapey Grandpa Tom. This was hands down the funniest thing I had ever heard in my life. If was even funnier than I came up with it. Tom wasn't amused. I can remember over the course of several months, maybe even a year, every time I saw him I'd call him Grapey Grandpa Tom. He'd always very kindly and patiently remind me that he didn't like that name. I think that made it more appealing to me.

When I was about 8ish, give or take a year or two, Nana and Tom were up in Orange County visiting us from their home in La Jolla. They were staying at a hotel in Laguna Beach. One night they took us all swimming, and a ring that my mom had given me fell off my finger into the deep end of the pool. This ring was very very dear to me because it looked like a cat wrapped around my finger. It reminded me of a cat that we had that had been killed by a coyote. Anyway, my ring was now in the deep end of the pool and I was too afraid to swim down to get it. Nana and Tom weren't swimming that night. They were just enjoying watching their grand-babies play. When Tom realized that I really was too afraid to get the ring myself and that my siblings thought it was funny to torture me by not helping me, he offered to get it for me. Under one condition. That's right.... I had to promise, cross my heart and hope to die, that I would NEVER call him Grapey Grandpa Tom EVER again! Deal! I needed that ring. After all it was a special gift from my mom. After a pinkie swear in he dove and when he returned to the surface of the water he had my ring in hand. Before he handed it over, he made me promise once again.

So there you have it. The beginning and the end of that nickname.

I first remembered this story about two weeks ago. It was of course one of my random thoughts that I had while sitting on the couch with my husband. I started laughing out loud, he asked what, to which I eagerly relayed the story to him. It was so funny reliving that memory that I immediately went to send an email to Nana and Tom to tell them all about this treasured memory that had just been recovered. I wasn't sure if Tom would remember. After all it's been about 15 years, and are silly little things like that really ever important to anyone else beside the person that they are happening too? The email I received back moved me to tears. Tom had remembered that. And he was so moved that I remembered that he cried.