Thursday, May 15, 2008

The Story of Dolly Dooz

Dolly Dooz is nothing more than the childhood nickname my parents gave me as a small girl that despite my shedding my little girl looks, simplicity and innocence has stuck with me. As recent as earlier this week, my mother responded to a blog entry on Myspace, in which she referred to me as "DD". That was not because of my ample chest, folks. It was Dolly Dooz. But my husband likes to think it is all about the "Double D's".

You would think that a couple who names their daughter Elizabeth but calls her Betsy would have no need for other nicknames, but I come from a family who name their cars, so naturally Betsy would never be enough. And even building on it, my nickname was often shortened to "Dolly" "Dooz" or my favorite "Doozer".

You would be right to wonder where such a nickname like this even came from. Years ago, my great-aunt Girlie (yup, that's what we called her) had a lullaby she'd sing to her grandkids and such. "Lolly Lu" was what it was called, but I couldn't tell you what the world the lyrics were now. I'm sure my cousin Jennifer was serenaded to it a million times. After she'd sang it to me one day, my parents started calling me Dolly and the "Dooz" wasn't far behind.

I can be thankful that my brother was not spared to this naming ritual and he has always been "Buddy Bar" (a.k.a. "Buddy", "Bud" and "Bar"). Yup, a happy family with Dolly Dooz and Buddy Bar - we sound like a family of drag queens.

Obviously, we are not the first and only family to have nicknames beyond "Baby", "Sweetie" and "Honey". In fact, Miley Cyrus is actually (for now) Destiny Hope Cyrus, but since she was so happy as a child, her family called her "Smiley" and somewhere along the way, she became Miley.

As I have gotten older, I have come to accept that no matter how much I protest my parents will neer be fully able to stop calling me by my nickname and I suppose I wouldn't want them to.

So after years of testing what felt like a perfect blog title embracing an essence of me, so to speak, I finally realized that I, Dolly Dooz, had to accept it. I am what I am.

Now I just need to design who that is.

What strange/funny nicknames did you have growing up?

1 comment:

  1. I had nothing so cute as you - I got Grandma (becuase I worried so much) and Big Foot (becuase my feet got huge before I grew). Now i'm "Sissy" to my mom. :)

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