Jamie Lynne Morris

That's my name. Take note. Not because I'm going to be famous one day or anything, but because I’m under the impression that it's a simple name. I have always thought that it was relatively hard to misspell or mispronounce. BUT, oh how wrong I was. So, I'm just asking that everyone take a nice little glance at how the letters combine and in what order.

I have to hand it to my parents; they did a pretty good job picking names for Ryan and me. Our names aren't unusual in any regard, but they aren't overused either, like many of the popular names of my generation. My only real complaint growing up was that it wasn't very easy to make a nickname out of Jamie. People have tried over the years, and a few have stuck, but for the most part, I'm just Jamie. And, at the age of 24, I'm quite happy with it. But in middle school, it was a different story.

At that age, there was this desire to find something unique about your name. There was one girl at our school that wanted to be unique so badly that she started spelling her name differently. She went from Jackie to Jakki. Her poor parents. My attempt was much less successful. Growing up, I had accumulated only two nicknames thus far, neither of which was exactly impressive – Jamerz and Jamie from Nebraska. So, I tried to get people to start calling me J.J. Just the thought of it makes me shudder. Fortunately, no one else saw the relation (noting the obvious - that there is no other “J” in my name) and it never caught. In fact, I don’t think a single person ever called me J.J. At the time, I was very disappointed.

I got over trying to force a nickname upon myself, and learned to just like being referred to as Jamie. But the glory days didn’t last long. When I entered high school (which was about 65% Latino) I encountered some new problems with my name. Teachers reading off the attendance sheet started hesitating and calling out the name “himay” (which might I add is actually spelled Jaime) AND is the name of a boy. There would be chuckling among my friends, but after a few classes at Sequoia High School, teachers caught on and the problem diminished. I thought I had heard the last of it, until that fateful afternoon in June of 2002.

The week before graduation all of us Seniors were handed name cards. We were supposed to fill out our name as we would like it read over the speaker system as we received our diploma. Beside each word, we were instructed to spell the name phonetically (so as to reduce mispronunciations on one of the most important days of your life). My friends and I laughed as we filled out these cards, because we all had pretty simple names to read, “Sarah Hogan”, “Adam Klein”, “Chelsea Lewis” etc. But nonetheless, I filled my card out like this:

Jamie (jay-me) Lynne (lin) Morris (more-iss)

So, I’m all dressed up in my graduation robe, sitting in the bleachers with my friends (alphabetically, I was close enough to exchange glances with Miskelly and Milanos). Our cue comes and my row stands and begins filing towards the podium. As I hand my name card (complete with pronunciation guide) to my guidance counselor and step up to the plate, I wait to hear this name that I have grown to love announced over the speaker system. Instead, this is what I, my parents, my friends, my family, and the families of all of my close friends heard, “Himay Lynne Morris”. Wide-eyed, I looked my counselor in the eye absolutely stunned. Ms. Dolores Sleeper looked back at this blonde, pale-skinned, 18-year-old, and stumbled out a quiet correction “Jamie” (which to this day no one remembers hearing besides myself).

Thanks to Dolores Sleeper I’d finally gotten myself that nickname I had so long ago desired. I can admit that the whole scenario is really quite entertaining now, when I visit with the families of those high school friends, they all laugh about Himay’s graduation. And the name started sticking. At some point in college, the story got out, and the nickname expanded on itself. I was now Himay Gonzales (with an accent of course) in certain circles, which is so ridiculous you just have to laugh, and to this day I still have one friend who calls me nothing other than Himay.

Now, here’s what you have to recognize. Himay, is the phonetic spelling of Jaime – the Hispanic version of my name. So, whenever someone spells my name Jaime, it strikes a little nerve and I have nightmares about that afternoon in July and those mornings when attendance was being read. While this was not included on my list of pet peeves, it should have been. With friends, I’ll usually forgive an initial misspelling or two, but I’m quick to correct after that point.

At food joints where the barista or whomever asks for your name, I’m always more entertained with the various ways that these professionals believe my name to be spelled. They’ve run the gamut – Jaymee being one of my favorite. A teammate on my softball team had a sister with the same name as me, but hers was spelled J-Me, on her birth certificate. I’ve taken up this method of spelling my name whenever I feel that the five letters are just too strenuous a task.

We won’t even get into my middle name. That’s almost always spelled without the “E”, which I can understand, and forgive considering how rarely it is used. My medical records at Kaiser still have me listed as Jamie Lynn because I’m too lazy to go through the process of showing up in person downtown to change the record. And as for Morris, it has only been in the last two or three years that I have started to take a liking to my name. As a kid I hated my last name because my signature always went to the dogs after the M-O. Two double cursive r’s… that’s just never attractive. The way I sign my name now, it looks like Jamie L. Mom’s.

So, here’s another window into the weird way that my mind works. I’m sure it sounds a little OCD, but if people started spelling my brother’s name Rian, I’m sure he’d have issue too. Well, OK maybe he’s a bad example. Point is, I’m sure every one of you has had at least one name issue in your day (except maybe my cousin Christopher Patrick Tate – that one’s pretty hard to screw up) but hey I thought my name was easy too… so who knows?

I have been known to respond to any of the following, if I have missed any feel free to correct me:

J.Mo
James
Paisley
Jame-Jame
Himay Gonzales
Himay
Jamie from Nebraska
Jamerz
Sister

But one last time, for the record, it’s Jamie Lynne Morris.