The Name Game

I’m going to come right out and say it. I want a nickname. Like a really bomb nickname. This weekend at Geo’s Frisbee party, I hung out with a room of guys I ONLY know by their nickname. And tonight, I watched Jersey Shore and they all have nicknames too. I’m jealous. All I want is a sick nickname. A sickname, if you will. But no. I’ve been Pharon my whole life.

There was a brief period of time when the guys I lived with called me P.H.-Dawg. It was a sorry attempt, because they had been calling Perek “P-Dawg” forever. So, I just got like the Xhilaration version of that. (Please tell me you know the brand Xhilaration. It’s the like generic brand of clothes at Target.) Eventually, and for like a couple weeks, they took to calling me “P.H.” I kind of liked it, but it was so vanilla. But, alas, they stopped calling me that anyways. And back to Pharon I went.

In middle school, I was known as “Pharon the Boy” for a couple traumatizing weeks. A couple jerks in my homeroom plastered the walls of the classroom with pieces of paper with a Microsoft Paint picture they drew of a boy, and on all of them, they wrote “PHARON THE BOY”. I walked in the room, my usual happy-go-lucky self, and my jaw dropped down to my Doc Martens. I seriously have NO idea why it started, but kids are cruel. I took it like a champ, though. Mercifully, this one eventually faded as well. Thank God.

In college, I sent in that little form to get some checks in the mail. They were going to be sooooo cute! Green pin stripes, I believe. So, I got the box of checks and went over to Madeline and Kelly’s house to show them off. (Luckily they are easily impressed.) I open the box of checks for them, very dramatically, and said “VOILA!” We took one look at them and Kelly burst out laughing. The checks were for PHARM. Sometimes Kelly still calls me Pharm. I think I’m even in her phone as Pharm. But again, it just didn’t stick.

As I mentioned a long time ago, my friend Claire calls me Papou. I actually do love that nickname. When she texts or Gchats me, she always says “Hey, Papou! How are YOU? What‘s NEW??” I love that! It rhymes, it’s cute, it’s not offensive, it didn’t stem from anything nasty. It’s perfect. But, she’s the only one who calls me that. It’s kind of our thing. But I want to walk into a party or business meeting and say, “Hey, what’s up? I’m Papou.” I can’t. No one else gets it.

But none of them stick! Can someone tell me how to get a nickname that actually STICKS? There’s like NO nickname for Pharon. It’s basically a nickname all in itself because it’s barely a real name. Curse this clever name! Can I just start one myself? Like, from now on everyone call me “Snooze”. Because I love to sleep, it rhymes with Booze, and, uh, my blog is Pharon Square, which rhymes with nightmare. When do you have a nightmare? When you’re taking a little snooze! I can’t believe no one else has thought of that!

Welp, this is Snooze, signing off…