Forgive me for stating the obvious, but my first name is
kind of weird. It’s Calla – not Kayla, Carla, or Callie. Calla.
Odd names like mine are a dime a dozen today. Parents
everywhere are giving their children complicated names – usually with an extra
letter y or two. So perhaps these kids will face the same anguish that I did
when faced with a rack of personalized pens or ornaments or keychains or what
have you.
There was never a Calla.
You know what I’m talking about: those big displays with
rows and rows of souvenir-y things with names printed on them. If your name was
Jessica or Emily or Steve or Todd, you’d have no trouble finding your name. My
parents (Tim and Brenda) and my brother (Mitch) could find their names.
However, my sister (Darrah) is most certainly in the same boat as me.
It’s hard to say if I even would’ve wanted any of this
personalized stuff if my name was more common and could be easily found.
However, I desperately wanted a keychain with my name on it – probably because
it was not at all easy to come by. I wanted what I couldn’t have, which was
something of a theme throughout my childhood.
But this was different. The personalized knick-knack
industry seemed remarkably unfair to me. Those rows and rows of names were an
affront to people like me. Why should we be left out? What happens when I want
a snowglobe ornament printed with my name? Nothing, that’s what.
Growing up, my three best friends were Sarah, Allison, and
Meagan. Sarah and Allison could usually find their names – Sarah’s only problem
was that “Sarah” was often sold out, and “Sara” wasn’t going to cut it. Allison
might be left with “Alison,” but more often than not, both “Allison” and
“Alison” were available. Meagan had a harder time – “Megan” was always there, but
“Meagan” was often not. You could find “Meghan” more easily than “Meagan.” But
you were a lot more likely to find “Meagan” than you were to find “Calla.”
Any personalized items that I had were thanks to special
orders placed by my parents. Now, you must remember that this was the mid-to-late
90s: you didn’t just jump on the internet and place an order and you’re done. My
family didn’t have internet until the year 2000, and even then, who knows how
many years it was before any of us was brave enough to online shop.
No, in order to get a special personalized order placed for
their kids with weird names, Mom and Dad had to go right to the source. The
first few things I ever had with my name on them were hand-made by my great
grandma Bunny: she was the craftiest person I’ve ever known, and she made me
pillows and cross-stitch and all sorts of things.
The other personalized item from my very early childhood was
a wooden cutout of my name painted with red hearts. I’m not sure who made this
or when I got it, but for YEARS, I loved hearts and the color red. So I was
apparently old enough to be able to impart that information. My parents knew
some woodworkers, so I’m betting my wooden name was a special order from one of
them.
When kindergarten rolled around, Mom
and Dad presented me with a brand new pencil box. It was red (of course), and
it had my NAME on it. I was thoroughly amazed, and that pencil box was my pride
and joy for many school years thereafter.
If you grow up with a more common
name, chances are that you will run into some fictional character somewhere
that shares your name. Alas, that privilege was difficult for me to come by –
made even more difficult by the fact that we didn’t have cable. Turns out there
was a Princess Calla in that old Disney
cartoon The Gummi Bears, a fact I
discovered thanks to my cousin sending me a Gummi Bears book. Princess Calla
had blonde hair and blue eyes like I did – clearly, the Gummi Bears people
modeled her after me.
How else would they know to give her a name like Calla?
 |
| The resemblance is uncanny. |
Mom and Dad noticed how much I
liked seeing my name in print, so for Christmas, they ordered a special copy of
Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer with
me as the star. The story was the same as regular Rudolph, but a special little
girl from Arlington named Calla got to help save Christmas. They even put
Claws, our crabby old cat, into the story.
Personalized items were such a rare
commodity, and every time I got one, I was blown away. I knew how much extra
work had to go into acquiring something with my peculiar name on it, and that
made those personalized items all the more special. I still have the keychain
my Grandma Sheila brought me from Albuquerque, the duffel bag my parents had made
for me in Colorado, the embroidered Arlington Cardinals
jacket I got for Christmas one year, and the little glass vial with my
name written on a piece of rice that my parents brought back from Las Vegas.
With the advent of the online
shopping, it’s nowhere near as difficult to get something personalized as it
once was. I can hop on Etsy and order something with my name on it in no time
at all. But that’s not really the point. The point is that I never got to
stumble across my name on a ready-made knick knack in a store. Except for ONCE.
I was at the Minnesota State Fair with my friend Lacee (who also had trouble
finding her name in such situations), and as we strolled through some of the
crafty booths in one of the giant buildings, we stopped at a display full of
little ceramic hearts. Now, this display consisted of several tables put
together, and it spanned for at least fifteen feet. (If you think I’m
exaggerating, you have clearly never been to the Minnesota State Fair.) These
little ceramic hearts were each painted with a name, and because of the sheer
volume, Lacee and I both started looking for our names. After all, when you’ve
got that many little ceramic hearts, it doesn’t hurt to look for the weird
names. And wouldn’t you know it? There was a Lacee AND a Calla. This was the
first and only time I’ve ever found my name. Did I buy the ceramic heart that
said Calla? Nope. I was a poor college student at the fair, and every spare
cent had to go towards greasy food and gas to get home. Sigh.
Because of that one experience –
that one glimmer of hope at the State Fair – I still look for my name in
souvenir shops selling those damn key chains and flashlights and whatnot. Even
though chances are good that I’m not going to find it, now that I’ve found it
once, I can’t seem to help wanting to find it again. And who knows? Maybe
someday I will.
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