"Hello, #Reverb10 Friends, My Name is....."

December 23 – New Name
Let’s meet again, for the first time. If you could introduce yourself to strangers by another name for just one day, what would it be and why? (Author: Becca Wilcott)

I love my name, just as it is. Julie Jordan Scott.

When I was a county bureaucrat oh, so many years ago, one of my co-workers made a placard for me that said, "Julie Jordan Scott, Grand Poobah."

Most of the time, then, before I reclaimed "ME" I went by Julie Scott, a name which makes me shudder, simply because those were the years when my soul went undercover, when I disappeared and fell asleep to not only myself, but to my destiny, my soul's journey, my (add your favorite "big, spiritual, bad-ass metaphor here.")

I have a pseudonym for any writing of mine that I deem may be hurtful to my loved ones. It has to be pretty "way out" there in order to slap my pseudonym down. Way back when I wrote of not wanting more children, a fact I was hiding, and because of my reasoning I didn't want it known who was speaking. I suppose the people who knew my writing voice might have recognized me and the most significant person got angry when my name mask wasn't enough.

When I first saw the prompt, I thought of all the "Hippie" possibilities. "Hello, I am Love." and then I thought of names like, "Lover of the River" and "Word Goddess" or "Writing Goddess", which one blog commenter said about me yesterday. I have sometimes called myself "Mom Extraordinaire" so for a day it could be, "How do you do, I am Mom Extraordinaire." I appreciate how Mary Oliver will write poems with "The Poet" in the title and I always figured she was speaking of herself. I have enjoyed writing Dead Woman poems, but I think if I introduced myself, "Hello, I am Dead Woman" people might think I am even quirkier than they do right now.

On a related interesting note, many bloggers will use pretend names and for me, at least since I became a professional, have always stuck with Julie Jordan Scott.

I become characters on stage and in film which feels like enough.

Right now I am set to play Big Momma in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, but that is not necessarily the most complimentary name to use to introduce myself to strangers.

When I was in college I would occasionally introduce myself to men who interested me by different names. I was either Jane or Laura. I had entire personalities - different versions of myself - that I used. I grew out of that many years ago and still feel tinges of guilt. Once I even gave a guy the dorm number and the name "Jane". He called. I cringed when I heard someone say, "Jane? There isn't a Jane on this floor."

Maybe, maybe, maybe, if I had to chance my name for just one day and I was in a situation where there were many strangers, I would use my word for 2011.

I like how it sounds, afterall.