I
don’t like it when people call me Rob.
As
a name, Rob is fine. No better or worse than Bob or Robert (or
even “hey you”) in the grand scheme of things. If it’s your name
and you like using it, awesome. And if you don’t like Bob, that’s
fine too.
There
are people that call me Rob. Some only once. Some repeatedly.
I usually end up blocking it out. I can recall more than a handful
of times when people said Rob and I never reacted. (Which is funny,
because “hey you” wasn’t all that much of a joke, and I’ve responded
to that quite often as well as several obscenities, while Rob
regularly flies right on by.)
End
result, Rob is a fine name, though I don’t like being called Rob.
I
suppose part of it comes from my father. He’s a Bob. And yes,
when younger, it was big Bob and little Bob.
Another
part I think comes from surroundings. Until I was several years
into school, I had never met a Rob. Every Robert I knew used Robert,
Bob or Bobby. Next door neighbors had a father-son combo of Bob
in the house. They were also big Bob and little Bob.
Fact
is, knowing a person’s preferences can be a reflection of knowing
the person. Is it Cat or Cath or Cathy? Is the name spelled out
with a y or an i? Is it spelled by doubling the letter n? Is the
formal name shifted to a nickname that we all would have guessed,
or did they select something unusual?
Knowing
any of this admits you to an inner circle of sorts. Not necessarily
a highly protected or excessively private inner circle. Intimate
might be a bit strong for a description. But, not knowing can
demonstrate a lack of familiarity more quickly than you could
ever imagine.
One
day I was working with a group of new employees at our company.
I forget the specifics, but we had wandered into the idea of knowing
a customer’s name. I mentioned the idea of shifting between the
formal (“Hello Mrs. Smith”) and informal (“Hey Jill”) during our
conversation. And I used my preference for not being called Rob
as one example of where it can go quite wrong, however pure or
innocent the intentions.
A
member of senior management came in to say hello and greet the
new staff. She stood in front of them and offered what you might
expect as a stereotypical we’re-a-big-family welcome message.
And she finished with this:
“Many
of these people will become like family because you’re with
them so often, just as I have over the years with the people
in your department like Rob.”
She
turned, smiled, and extended a hand toward me in recognition.
I never broke the contact of looking toward her, but peripherally
I could see every head in the classroom snap as they shot from
her to me after she called me Rob. We had just been talking about
it… and there it was. I smiled and nodded as an acknowledgement
of her thoughts, then after she left tackled the subject that
had become rather important ground to navigate.
I
suppose you never really know. You hope you get these things right,
and don’t make too many mistakes. I know family members that aren’t
sure when to use an i or a y or something else entirely in writing
out a name for members of the family. Mistakes can be innocent,
after all.
It’s
the thought that counts. I suppose. That is, unless you call me
Rob.