Who? Oh...you mean me?

Starrett, Slagle, Offenbach, Donizetti, Borcoman, Kehres, Leiendecker, Scarpitti, Kayleigh, Marquese, Aylward, Wuyanbu, and Damonte….., what do all these names have in common? They were spelled correctly (I am assuming because spellchecky thingy is almost out of red ink) in the local Canton paper.  Mangala, Bacopoulos, Gacgowski,  and…oh forget it, ditto on the red ink comment….what do these names have in common?  They were spelled correctly on the program of a local major fundraiser. What do Judy and Kres have in common? They are both spelled wrong when one is referring to me in print. Not to mention previous bastardizations such as Judie, Jodie, Julie, Jude, Joodie and Jedi, along with Krewe, Kruw, Kreu, Knew, Crew, Crewe, Cru and Crews…..so if I ever say I am off finding myself, don’t come looking because it is going to be a long trip! 

With all our technological abilities, like adding a name to a dictionary in spell check, one would think the process of proofreading and correction would be easy. Nope. The local Canton paper has printed my name for various reasons over the last 20 years and for the most part…okay 60% of the time they get it right. The local fundraiser, for whom we have donated lot$ of time and money over the years, prints our name every year…..with a good 95% correct rate. Details. I remember writing a blog about how important it is to check the details when listing names so as to not leave some off, or misspell them. 

Us short name folks seem to get shortchanged for which I could probably come up with several excuses as to why. This inattention happens frequently in person too. When purchasing an item for which someone must write down my name on an order slip…I can stand there and spell it as they write and they still get it wrong. Why? They are not really listening to me. They heard me say it and I can watch them write it while I spell it out loud but I don’t correct them until they are done. Then I (in a smile soaked snark) point out they were not listening and to please correct it….bitchy I know, but lesson learned. 

I took on my husband’s name when we married 28.75 years ago. Google it now and you won’t find many of us. Used to be I checked phone books all over the country looking for other members to add to the Krew Crew but nada unless it was a skate board clothing line or some group trying to be cute with its product spelling or club. There are some who have the “misspellings” as their family name but not as we spell it. With four boys in the next generation down, the name will hopefully continue on as spelled however. 

As I understand it, the name did not come to be mine as we spell it now. And how it left one continent and arrived on this continent is different as well, at least that is the story I am told. At different points of entry over time, and in the aftermath of WW2, things got confusing.  So here we are with a nice simple 4 letter last name and the world still can’t spell it right. Quite a few multi-syllable non American names are shortened to 4 or 5 letters quite often for ease in pronunciation and spelling so this is not a new situation. 

My first name is just an abbreviation of my full Christian name by dropping the last two letters. So why do people change the last letter even when I am asked if my first name is really the full Christian name that uses the “I” in its correct spelling? Although my husband has the same thing with a drop of a “c” and a switch of an “e” and an addition of a “k” when Michael becomes Mike, nobody ever misspells either one of those names. Weird. There are other Judi’s in this town who spell it like me, and I don’t see their names misspelled in print nearly as often as I do mine and all three of us are in the arts. 

Okay, sorry for the complaining but when one is trying to have a career based a great deal upon name recognition, spelling it correctly becomes a pet peeve.  Other examples include show award certificates with my name spelled wrong, the occasion show ribbon, programs too numerous to count anymore, assorted rejection letters (whereas acceptance letters get it right) and I could go on. Know who always spell it right? Organizations asking for money, donations, renewals etc…oh yeah, if they want the $ they pay attention. Once they have the $, they don’t give a crap.  Some friends and I have a running joke that I should just change my name to Jewdee Cru as it would be phonetically spelled I suppose and then I bet it would be right every time. But until then, my little saying remains the same…”Judi with an I, Krew with a K”.  

PS

Hey local Canton paper……want to print a retraction and get it right? But please don’t do what happened the last time, the retraction just misspelled my other name that time while correcting the first mistaken name. I did not bother asking for a retraction of the retraction, Lord knows what would have been my name that time! At least you made the top of the charts for a classic krewation.