My Name

"I bet you didn't know this about me"...I told David this the other night and I am pretty sure he is the only one I have admitted this too.  

I cringe a little each time someone says my name.  

I know that is weird.  But they either pronounce it, "Aleesha" or "Aleesa."  It's not that I am that person that gets offended when someone says my name wrong.  I honestly don't care.  It's not their fault my name isn't spelled the way it is pronounced.  Long story as to why this is but lets just make it simple and know that my given name is spelled Alisa but pronounced, "Alisha" or "Aleesha"...or however that would be spelled.  But around the time I moved to Oklahoma, as a child, I started telling people that my name was "Aleesa" (or Alisa, the way my name sounds when someone who has just read my name for the first time).  Again, long story but I did have a good reason to it. So I grew up with everyone in the home and at church calling me "Alisha" but everyone at school or work calling me "Alisa."  Fast forward to college.  Everyone knew me as "Alisa" until my second year of college and Marie was one of my roommates.  I grew up with her family at church.  She, of course, was going to call me "Alisha."  I don't know how many times I heard after that, "I thought your name was, "Alisa."  I soon decided it was time to go by my given name.  It was time to stop confusing people.  

The funny part of this story?  For quite some time after I made this decision, when I would meet new people and they would ask me my name it usually went like this:  "Alisa....um, I mean, Alisha."  I would get the strangest looks as I'm sure people were wondering if I was running from the law or in the witness protection or just plain weird.  Yeah, probably just weird.

And nothing feels weirder than when I am calling up an old friend that knew me as "Alisa" and having to leave a message.  "This is Alis(h)a Adams....But you probably remember me as Alisa Beck, ummm...this is weird...."

So, there it is.  I really don't like hearing my name because it just feels weird.  I think that is why I appreciate hearing David call me "Babe."

But I do love my name.  I have always thought it was pretty spelled out and  I love the story behind it.  I'm the one who made my name weird.  Oh well, right?