(I wrote this originally for another venue. The editor there thought it too much of a rant. I’m sure it’s that, and I want to share this in the lighthearted manner it was intended. Hope you get a chuckle out of it.)<\/p>\n
Did you ever think everyone around you was stupid because they couldn\u2019t get your fucking name right? I wish people would just learn to read, and absorb what their eyes tell their brain. Sadly, it doesn\u2019t happen as often as I would like.<\/p>\n
My birth name is Donald Evan Hornstein. For as long as I can remember, my family called me Donny. Or Don Don. Or Donella (little Donny in Yiddish.) But mostly, it\u2019s Donny. With a \u2018y.\u2019 And not Danny. Getting people to remember that, though, might take an act of Congress; and even then, under penalty of whatever, I don\u2019t think they\u2019ll pay attention and get it right.<\/p>\n
I didn\u2019t always use Donny, though. In the late 1960s, 1966 to be precise, Marlo Thomas stars on TV in \u2018That Girl.\u2019 What red blooded American male isn\u2019t in love with Marlo Thomas? Me, included. On the show, she calls her boyfriend, Donald. OMG, (I was way ahead of my time) if I make people call me Donald, maybe I\u2019ll get Marlo Thomas, or at least a reasonable facsimile. A boy can dream, can\u2019t he? For the next decade or so, it\u2019s Donald, and I never have to worry about someone misspelling my name. Maybe I\u2019m a slow learner.<\/p>\n
In college, the group I run around with has two brothers in it, Bobby & Donnie (yes, with an ‘ie) Ginsberg. Every time I hear Donnie\u2019s name, something inside me quakes a little. (Remember, I\u2019m still running around as Donald hoping for Marlo to show up, but I like how it sounds when someone says Donny.) I don\u2019t realize consciously, I\u2019m starting to struggle with such a formal name on such an informal guy. After all, I hate suits. I want to go to job interviews in business casual. Someone always has to remind me to put on a jacket and maybe even a tie.<\/p>\n
In the late 1970s, I become a newspaper photographer and I begin to struggle with my credit line. Donald Hornstein? Don Hornstein? But never Donny Hornstein, the name I gave up for Marlo. I never have to go to a typesetter or editor or anyone to make sure they spell my name correctly. (Now I\u2019m really starting to believe I\u2019m a slow learner.) But, I struggle with my credit line, because it never looks right to me. I\u2019m at the point where I start to wonder who this Donald guy is, because it sure as heck ain\u2019t me.<\/p>\n
I bomb out of photojournalism due to my Peck\u2019s Bad Boy attitude (did you see me in Oral Fixation\u2019s Slippery Slope? It\u2019s on YouTube: https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=xMIzdUTY3gE<\/a>) It\u2019s many years later, about a decade in fact, I\u2019m living in Dallas, and working in a network marketing organization selling term life insurance. \u201cBuy Term & Invest the Difference\u201d is the motto of the company. I\u2019m attending a weekly meeting with the Regional Vice President with whom I work. A good ol\u2019 Texas boy, Steve, sees me and says, \u201cHey, Donny, how\u2019s it goin\u2019?\u201d I stop dead in my tracks. \u201cWhy did you just call me Donny? No one has called me that for years.\u201d He kinda scratches his head and says, \u201cWell, that\u2019s my little brother\u2019s name. It just came out.\u201d I think to myself, \u201cCrap, Marlo Thomas is married to Phil Donahue. I don\u2019t have a chance in hell with her. I should use the name I\u2019m most comfortable with. It\u2019s 1988 and I\u2019m back to calling myself Donny, and I like it.<\/p>\n But, now, the problem starts. People are either spelling my name wrong or calling me by someone else\u2019s name. Crap! Not quite as bad, people who knew me during the Donald years, a bunch of old fogies now, refuse to call me Donny. In one case, a girl I dated in college, calls me Donald for many of the same reasons she did 40 years ago. Her father is Robert Donald and goes by Don. Her brother is Robert Donald, Jr. and goes by Donny. When we were dating, it just made sense for me to be Donald (even though she wasn\u2019t Marlo, she did kinda remind me of her.)<\/p>\n For nearly 30 years, it seems like every time I turn around, someone is screwing up my name. A part of me just wants to let it go. The other part, let\u2019s call him the asshole, wants to cut everyone off at the knees who gets it wrong. He usually wins. The first guy says, \u201cJust let it go. People just don\u2019t pay attention. It\u2019s no big deal.\u201d The other guy, throws a hissy fit. \u201cHell no, why can\u2019t people get my name right? How difficult is this? We\u2019re talking about the modern man, not the planet of the apes!\u201d<\/p>\n In an email exchange recently, a man I\u2019ve known for 14 years wrote, \u201cBruce, u and Donnie, D-O-N-N-I-E, were missed\u201d….I mean seriously! In any email, my name appears in the from field and typically in a signature. D-O-N-N-Y. We ain\u2019t talkin\u2019 rocket science here, folks. I wrote him back and say, \u201cAfter all these years you can’t spell my name \ud83d\ude09 (smiley face.) His response, \u201cI think it was sub conscience. The “i.e.” (sic) just means fun and light hearted (sic) to me.\u201d Really, that\u2019s the best he could do? And, how in the hell does Donnie with an ‘ie’ mean lighthearted and fun? Is that in some secret dictionary someplace? And do I have to know a secret handshake to see it? Puhleeeeease!<\/p>\n The other one, especially today with email so prevalent a form of communication, is Danny. My brain immediately goes to \u201cAre you stupid or what?\u201d There\u2019s my name again at least twice in our email exchange. Oh, I get it! Most of us don\u2019t want to admit we need glasses, if only reading glasses. They look at my name and mistake the \u2018o\u2019 for an \u2018a\u2019. They\u2019re both vowels after all. OK, maybe. Could ya just please let your eyes and your brain work together? The asshole would really appreciate it.<\/p>\n I should end this by telling you I\u2019m not the only one in my family with issues around a name. My brother is Jerrold, J-E-R-R-O-L-D. He complains it\u2019s our Mother\u2019s fault. What? He says the more common spelling is G-E-R-A-L-D. Where he came up with that, I haven\u2019t a clue. Maybe a secret addition of Poor Richard\u2019s Almanac. You need another secret handshake to see that. Nonetheless, he thinks our Mother just didn\u2019t do such a great job with our names. Maybe. I wonder, since most people call him Jerry, if he gets G-E-R-R-I-E? Or Gary? Criminy!<\/p>\n Perhaps the writing really is on the wall. If I\u2019d just stuck with Donald I wouldn\u2019t be in this predicament. Or maybe, Mom could\u2019ve named me Bill or George or even Sue! Nah. Just do me a favor and try to remember, it\u2019s Donny, with a \u2018y\u2019. And not Danny.<\/p>\n How Am I Changing? <\/strong>I’m trying to not sweat the small stuff. I really am. It’s just that the asshole keeps getting in the way.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" (I wrote this originally for another venue. The editor there thought it too much of a rant. I’m sure it’s that, and I want to share this in the lighthearted manner it was intended. Hope you get a chuckle out of it.) Did you ever think everyone around you was stupid because they couldn\u2019t get … Continue reading “It’s Donny, with a ‘y’ and not Danny”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-284","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-funny"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.howamichanging.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.howamichanging.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.howamichanging.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.howamichanging.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.howamichanging.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=284"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.howamichanging.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":317,"href":"https:\/\/www.howamichanging.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284\/revisions\/317"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.howamichanging.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=284"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.howamichanging.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=284"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.howamichanging.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=284"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}