I honestly do not know why this is. I do my best to call people by the name they wish to be known by. My best friend's name is Anthony, but he prefers to be called Tony and that is what I call him. Another friend is Richard who prefers to be called Rich or Richie, and so again, that is what I call him. Recently a friend of mine whose name is Justin decided that he would prefer to be called Jay. Now I sometimes get that wrong and refer to him as Justin, but on the whole I try to remember his preference and address him by the name he prefers. In this and in other examples I try to show respect to their wishes. And yet despite this nobody seems to care about my name or showing me the same respect that I accord to others.
To everyone I am Bob. It doesn't seem to matter to people when I introduce myself as Robert, soon enough they switch to Bob, or in some very few cases to Rob. I despise Rob, it is a bastardised version of my name for those too lazy to say two syllables instead of one. But that's nothing to how much I dislike being called Bob. Let me be very clear on this:
I FUCKING HATE BEING CALLED BOB
I'm not sure when the trend amongst my friends for calling me Bob started exactly. I'm not sure quite how it got so widespread either. I've never made any secret of the fact that I hate being called Bob and yet everyone I know has felt that I must be joking apparently as they've felt free to just outright ignore whatever I've had to say about it. I don't like conflict (ironic I know coming from someone who collects and paints figures to fight tabletop war games!) and so despite numerous protests over the years that Bob is not my name, I've mostly, in retrospect rather stupidly, tolerated being called such.
I'm sat here now, with my 36th birthday almost upon me, having just had a conversation with my friend Jon in which he expressed his surprise that I was not going to my own birthday party. The party event page for this on Facebook is titled "Tony and Silent Bob's Birthday". The text for this reads as follows "Ok it's mine and Bobs birthday again (This happens far too often got to stop this aging lark), So I'd like to invite you all to join me (and maybe Bob!) for few drinks and maybe something to eat to celebrate". I've posted on the Wall there that he might wish to change the name of the event as that is not my name and I won't be there, and Jon actually seems shocked by this.
All the times I've mentioned that I hate being called Bob over the years have apparently never even been heard. In one ear and out the other. This possibly would not rankle me as much as it does if the very people doing this were not also those who are my friends. If it were complete strangers who referred to me as Bob, it likely would not burn the way that having those closest to me call me by this abomination of a name does. I could be an ass about this and start calling them all by whatever name/s I felt like, but two wrongs do not make a right. Honestly I do not know how to go about fixing this. I want my name back, but I do not want to lose my friends to get it back.
