Letter From The Other Side; from Cynthia. 'It's All In The Names.'


Dear Del,

We all think of our name as our own individual identification don’t we?
Of course many people go through life identified by their friends and family by a nickname but even the nickname can be a problem. There is always a ‘Bluey’ around, so called because of his red hair. Every town has a Musty because of his reluctance to open his wallet or a Lofty because of his height and of course we mustn’t forget Gunna. You know him, that fellow who is always ‘Gunna’ do this and ‘Gunna’ do that but doesn’t ever make the time to do much at all.

We think of our names as special things and like to keep our ‘good name’ and hope people or family won’t ‘ruin our good name’ or sully our family name in any way.

The first time a person becomes aware of sharing the same name with someone else can come as a shock, particularly if you meet them and you dislike them at once for some reason.

Years ago Teddy was confused by the stares of people who seemed reluctant to speak to him for a time until he found out he and a man who had been stealing from the company they both
worked for, shared the same name. Once the other man was identified in the press and the confusion was cleared up, Teddy became popular again.


A few decades later when I registered at a new medical surgery I discovered I shared my name with four other women also registered on their books. It made it confusing for the staff,
who had to make sure they double checked my address and details to ensure the doctors were given the correct details and didn’t mix up our files.

About six months later, Teddy began receiving sympathy cards from all over the district and interstate. At first he thought it was some sort of sick practical joke until we heard that
one of my other namesakes had been killed in a dreadful accident. We felt awful for thinking bad things about the senders of the cards and made sure we eventually found out her address and forwarded the cards onto her bereaved family. Although we hadn’t ever met her, we almost felt we knew her after opening the cards and reading some of the thoughts which had been expressed.

The next thing was to have problems with the small local bank when they mixed my name and address with another namesake. Luckily it was still during the days of being able to deal with your local branch manager face to face and not with a computer with tentacles which
became entangled and very hard to straiten out. The problem was fixed with apologies all round.

A mix up with names can also lead to funny incidents.
Teddy’s dad, Huey, had not been working in his allotment for a few weeks and when he returned to it, he found that some of his tools were missing.
The next time he went even more of his tools were missing and also some of the vegetables were gone.
“I swear I’ll catch the *****
that’s stealing from me.” He declared, irate that the prized vegetables he had worked on were on someone else’s dinner plate.

Sure enough when he went down to the allotment there was a fellow working away in his plot. He walked up quietly behind him and reached out to tap him on the shoulder. ‘What d’ya’mean by
stealing my stuff?’ he bellowed in the small man’s ear.

The chap swung around and staggered back and away from Huey who could look quite intimidating even though he was also short. His pronounced jutting jaw and broom of black hair which appeared to explode from his scalp could be very unnerving when his temper was
roused.

‘B’y God man, you’re dead.’ The little fellow squeaked. Huey declared the bloke turned as white as his hair, his knees buckled and he flopped into the furrow he had been digging.
Huey realizing how shocked the poor bloke was went no further with his accusations but assured the man he felt more alive than Don, as he was called, looked at that moment sitting at his
feet in a muddy plot of soil panting and shaking.
Eventually he and Don worked out that the people in the council office had been notified of the death of a man bearing the same name as Huey and had of course mixed up which allotment
had become available. It took him a while to reclaim the missing tools and for a while reassure people who had heard of his ‘death’ that they weren’t seeing a ghost.

I suppose the worst mix-up I have experienced was the day after giving birth to our daughter when I was handed a baby to feed. I knew immediately it was not my baby and when I said to the nurse it wasn’t my child she stared at me for a time and without checking any further went to get the nurse in charge. This large, loud voiced;absolutely no nonsense ex-army nurse came and demanded why I wasn’t feeding the baby.
‘It isn’t my baby’, I answered plaintively.
‘Stop being so neurotic’, she ordered, ‘and feed that child.’
I sat mute for some time looking at the little ginger haired child. It wasn’t mine. My daughter I was sure, even though I had only a couple of glimpses of her before she was rushed
off to the nursery where all the newborns were placed behind glass screens they used during the 1960’s to allow the fathers to view them.
I examined the tiny fingers, I examined more….. no definitely not, this was not my little girl, this was a little boy!
The sound of a stiffly starched uniform hurrying along the hospital corridor caught my attention and the nurse re-entered the ward carrying a baby.
‘Here Cynthia this is your baby I’ll take that one.’
She snatched the small red headed Cuckoo she had almost forced onto me and placed my daughter in my arms.‘Get on with feeding her’, she demanded as she rushed off without an apology or any sort of acknowledgement of the mistake.

I read of this same thing happening in a Victorian hospital a couple of months ago and they were in big trouble. It was splashed all over the papers and the mother received counselling and no doubt monetary recompense.
I wonder if her doctor also offered to circumcise her baby girl as my forgetful one did. That would have cost them months of counselling and even more money.

Maybe that is what is at the back of all my problems. Not enough counselling during my life.

Aaaah it’s all in the name they say. Well, not always, I think the name can be a problem as well.

I envy you Del if you cherish a name no other shares, because I can assure you it can be a trial at times.


Cheers
Cynthia.