What's in a name?

It's astounding how much your name matters to your identity, isn't it?

Growing up, I never liked my birth name. It was a name that I never thought really suited me. I had what you'd call a "unique" name. As in, I've never met anyone else with that name in my twenty-some years of living. Not once.

I always got those comments, you know. "Oh, how do you say your name? WOW! That's so pretty!"

Yeah, it's not so "pretty" when you spend twenty years having maybe 2% of the population even consider saying your name right. Spelling it right. Remembering it without being corrected several times.

Through the past decade, I've gone through several names - some feminine, some androgynous. It doesn't seem like a big deal to people. I had comments before I came out as trans along the lines of "You don't like your name so you're changing it? That's stupid/silly. Don't do that."

Why the fuck not? I've never enjoyed my name. It doesn't describe me. It's never really describe me. It's like, in addition to having gender dysphoria, I've had name dysphoria. The names I went through stuck, but I shed them. Like a style, or a fad. Nothing was really descriptive of me, of the person I was, or of the person I was becoming.

When I moved states and started over two years ago (still not out as trans, stupid me), I chose a name that was androgynous. It could have been male or female. Naturally, people want to spell it the more feminine (and complicated) way. I chose the masculine spelling for a reason, but of course no one knew that.

I spent two years with this name that I liked, but that wasn't really me. I had been Tim to my friends since 2005. My parents did not know this. One of my parents still does not know this. I was convinced, however, that as a performer (and a woman), I could not conceivably be known as Tim.

Well, now it's a new decade and I'm not a new person, but I've got a new perspective. Part of that perspective consists of stop lying about who you are.

The show I'm in now marks the first time I've been in a situation where everyone unquestioningly calls me by my name. Tim. Most of them don't know it's Timothy, but I'd probably punch almost anyone who called me Timothy and wasn't over the age of fifty, or related to me. Hell, most of them don't actually know I'm transgendered, because this has to be done in baby steps, and suddenly telling a cast of Mormons that HEY one of your named roles is a dude in drag really isn't the greatest option ever!

But it doesn't really matter. I'll get to all of that as I continue this journey. I will. I'm working on it.

What matters is that someone I do not even know in the cast came up to me today and said, "Hi Tim."

No weird looks. No questions as to why. Just this unfaltering acknowledgement of my identity.

I never really knew that it would be so goddamned important to me to just be called the right thing. But it is. And this girl whose name I did not know until tonight proved it to me.

My name is so integral to my identity, in ways and for reasons I cannot put into words. Acknowledging me as Tim is acknowledging me as myself.

Thank you, chorus girl whose name I will not publish on the internet. You'll never know what a big thing you've done.