Muffie Wants a New Name

My sister Muffie doesn't like her name and has decided she wants a new one.  We were born into the Jones family in the mid 1950s.  And my mother had this run off to Paris and be a painter fantasy to keep her from going stark raving mad in the laundry room.  So she gave us all glamorous first names to offset the drab Jones.  Well, all of us except my sister.  For her, my mom chose a multisyllabic wonder.  I don't think it's so bad, but my sister hates it and hates even more the nickname associated with it.  I can't even print it here .... but let's just say it's something like being named Mustowoxington, and being called Muffie.

Which was fine until she was about 12.  Then we moved from Little Rock to Tuscaloosa to Montgomery, and my sister lost weight and grew breasts and discarded Muffie in favor of Mustowoxington.  She wasn't crazy about that either, but it was more suitable to her aspirations as Queen of the Whole World.

The only drawback was that each summer we spent a month with our grandparents, cousins, and old family friends in Michigan, and there everyone kept calling her Muffie.  "Who is this Mustowoxington person?" they would say.

To this day, whenever we are in Michigan, like last week, she is Muffie.  We were walking down to the beach and passed these adorable little sun-kissed sisters named Annabelle and Olivia.  Muffie groaned at the lilting beauty of their names.  "I hate Muffie.  I need a new name."

"Perfect timing!  I'm writing a blog and I need a pseudonym for you.  Pick a new name.  Any name!"  You see, I  use pseudonyms.  I like mystery.  I don't like to splash my life or the lives of those I love out there for all the world to see.  The one exception is my first name; it really is Mimi.  But I like my name.  I am the third generation Mimi in my family, and my sister reminds me that since she is older, she should have gotten the Mimi name.  She is still annoyed about that.

So yesterday Muffie decided her pseudonym will be Niqi.  It's short for Dominique, but pronounced Nicky.  It's also the name of a character in my book, the character based loosely on my sister, the chief comic relief, fizzy flirt, and fixer of margaritas.

"I'm so excited I can hardly stand it!!!   I love my new name!!!  Do you think I should get towels monogrammed with it?"

"Of course you should.  And notecards.  Maybe a personalized coffee mug and picture frame.  Definitely a monogrammed beach towel and beach bag."  I love spreading joy.

She was squealing with delight and relief and excitement for the new vistas opening up before her .... years of Muffie baggage being shed.  "I need to go somewhere to use my new name.  I can't use it here.  I'm in real estate.  Everyone knows me.   Where can I go?"

Boy, that's a loaded question that I'm not prepared for.  Muffie knows everyone in the whole world.  She is a connector, as they say in The Tipping Point.  She can't just move somewhere and change her name.  Everyone everywhere knows Muffie.  And Muffie is fabulous.  She is so fabulous no one even notices her less than fabulous name.  Except her.

Well ..... we'll think about that tomorrow.  Right now we'll just ease into Niqi-land with a few cute doodads and see how that goes.  Maybe we'll even get coordinating margarita glasses .... Mimi (in green) and Niqi (in pink).   It's the little things that get us from today to tomorrow with a smile.