As I look back on my years, I’ve discovered that I’ve had my fair share of nicknames. That kinda surprises me because I’ve never thought of myself as a guy that was prone to being nicknamed. I have no distinguishing physical features, except for maybe a large, unwieldy head or perhaps being slight in stature.
The very first nickname I can remember having was given to me by my all-time favourite teacher, Mrs. S. Kilpatrick. She was my homeroom teacher for grades 8, 9, and 10. She called me “orange flavoured crystals”. I don’t think anyone else called me that but she did. Mrs. K. also introduced me and the other students in English 8 to the book, The Outsiders. If you ever hear me say, “Stay gold Ponyboy,” you know I mean it.
In junior high, I also garnered another nickname. One Andrew Brown began calling me “Irv”, a play on my first name. I actually liked that moniker and several people picked up on it. It stayed with me through high school but it eventually fell by the wayside after we graduated.
I don’t remember any nicknames during my undergrad days, which is weird since a lot of rabble-rousing occurs in your school days. Maybe people called me names behind my back but I never heard those.
It wasn’t until the heady days of grad school where I would once again be known by another name. Fellow SJC resident, Miriam, the pride of Creston (or was it Lytton?), began calling me E-dawg. Then again, she started calling everyone something-dawg so I suppose I shouldn’t feel too special. Just today, a former co-worker of mine called me E-dawg. Small world!
I forget if this was slightly after grad school but I gained another nickname from the infamous lawyer of SJC, Joel himself. He took to calling me Winnie. Independently, during the summer of 2005, my co-worker Dave, started calling me Winnie as well. I have to admit, I quite like Winnie. Some people are reminded of Pooh the bear but most people think of Winnie from The Wonder Years. If you may indulge me in a slight tangent… hey, maybe that could be a nickname too… anyways, the actress that played Winnie, Danica McKellar, went onto attend Stanford where she received a degree in mathematics. She even got a proof published. A girl that knows her math is hawt! The special spelling denotes extra hawtness. If anyone is interested, here’s her photo shoot from Stuff magazine. In the interview, they discuss the proof.
And that’s my collection of nicknames thus far.