A Cheap and Easy Way to Reinvent Yourself

There's a woman I know who pronounces her first name differently everytime she introduces herself to someone new. As far as I know, no one has ever let her know that we're on to her, but everyone is. It's become one of those things that you gossip about after a few beers, constantly peering over the top of the booth to make sure no one's within ear shot.

It really used to get on my nerves. I thought it was pretentious and annoying. Get over yourself, I thought. After years of biting my tongue everytime I heard her pronounce her own name, three days ago I finally understood why she does it.

She gets to be a different person with each name. Long "a" is intelligent and mature; short "a" is fun and spunky; "schwa a" is exotic and mysterious.

Now that I get it, I'm sort of jealous of her. Everytime she meets someone new, she creates a clean slate for herself. The new people will only know about her past mistakes if she chooses to tell them herself.

Thinking about things that I've done in the past and people I've hurt, I find myself wishing for a new way to say "Becky."