I'm Coming Out

Because I want the world to know, my name is not really June. It is Alexis. Most of you may have gathered that by now probably but it is with frustration that has been building for years that I tell you my name. Alexis. A-L-E-X-I-S, not Alex.

For years and years, from school to work and now as you could possibly tell from the ultrasound the doctors office, people have been shortening my name for absolutely no reason that I can see to Alex. When I was growing up my family called me Lexi or Lex and that is how most people who knew me before high school know me. It's actually pretty interesting to me, you can tell who has known me longer by what they call me. My sister still calls me Lex informally. This is a nickname I was given, it's dear to me, Alex on the other hand just irks me to know end and I can't even really explain it.

It started to really bother me when strangers at the grocery store where I first worked would want to be formal with me and use my name, but then completely ignore the last two letters of my name. I could never understand if they couldn't pronounce it or they just had it in thier minds to give me what they may have thought was a popular nickname for my first name. I didn't appreciate it. And dozens of people did it over the course of my career in retail. I hated wearing a name tag. I thought of changing my name.

Maybe it's because Alex sounds like a boy name. I just know I hate it. It seemed rude. But it continued in college where I was often called at the beginning of the semester as 'Alex' or professors in my smaller classes would ask if I wanted to be called 'Alex'. Is Alexis such a strange name? At my high school and college graduations my name was botched by the person calling out diplomas and degrees. At my high school graduation they said Alex and tried to cover it up with the -is, making a long drawn out mess of my name. I just rolled my eyes. In college it was actually my middle name. Instead of Aileen they called me Eileen. Maybe it's where I live, maybe people have a hard time with pronunciation, but it really drives me up the wall.

I know it shouldn't bother me and I have mostly come to laugh at how my six letter name so easily gets said incorrectly but sometimes if the dog tore up the trash that morning and I burnt my morning toast a small thing like 'Alex' can just ruin my day.

I am so sensitive about it that I can't stand spelling or saying someone elses name wrong. For a few years I was spelling my neices name wrong before someone finally brought it to my attention, I was mortified. It's just not my style. Sorry Haley.

So if you want to call me or email me or send me flowers, that would be great, but for my sake please keep the -is.

I know we're Lancers, but we're just not THAT close.

I love my neighbors, not all of them necessarily but I really like the people who live closest to us. They donated their dilapidated playhouse to us, they fix Ward's guitars for free, they let us come in their house when they're gone and borrow eggs and we always have dependable house/dog sitters when we go out of town FOR FREE (they have a dog with whom we do the same). They come to our house for holidays and parties, we buy from their children's fund raisers and they, being the horticulturist type, trim our shrubs and flowers when we are 8 months pregnant. We all went to the same high school even though we attended ten and twenty years apart from one another (with the exception of Ward, who was a Colonel). We are pretty close, as far as neighbors go.

Or so I thought.

Recently, like yesterday, a friend of mine told me that her neighbor went into labor. She hadn't seen or spoken to the new parents but she had spoken with another neighbor who had told her all the details. How did she know all the details, why she was in the room, how else (OK, I understand someone could have told her but I am looking for dramatic effect here people). But she wasn't the only neighbor who attended the birth, two others did as well.

As stated before, I really like my neighbor's, but I also like privacy. When I gave birth it was a family only ordeal and when I mean family it was Ward and I. I would have perhaps had more people in the room (my sister) but I just felt too uncomfortable about how the situation could end up (like it did, emergency c-section at 5 a.m.). But my neighbors, they were never on the attendance list. I did see my neighbor when I was in labor, but only to my surprise on the hospitals Epidural video. I like privacy, I don't tell many people about the origins of my children's existence, I didn't tell people I was pregnant until my second trimester or that I was pregnant with twins until I had passed the twenty week miscarriage date and I certainly don't invite them to my deliveries. I know, I am the one with issues.

I know a lot of people though, who embrace a lot of people attending the miraculous event that is childbirth but now that I have both attended one and been responsible for one I feel even more the need for privacy in the delivery room. I don't mean that parents, siblings, or other close people should be kept from the delivery, I just think that it is not a place for friends and acquaintances. Things can happen without any warning and I just have to wonder is it really a good idea to have so many people in attendance? My doctor would only allow Ward and one other person in the room, I am sure that was mainly for her liability purposes but I don't think it is such a bad policy.

I think that mainly for me it is that I am a controlling person. I like to be in control and giving birth is one time when I felt that I was only in partial control of the situation (until the c-section when I felt I lost all control of the situation). But what do you think, am I just being weird? I have watched those birthing stories on TLC, I would just never want to be on their show.

-june

I was given full permission to tell this story, no names or other information have been disclosed, mainly because I didn't get any other information, it seemed too private.

20 Cents An Hour Increase?

So you may not be able to tell from my camera phone picture to the left there, but Sheetz here in town is officially out of 87/89 octane gasoline.

That's right due to all that demand this afternoon all you can get is 93 octane for $3.89 a gallon.

So I guess it's a good thing that I drove up to Sheetz at 3:30 this afternoon (because my brother-in-law in Phoenix called and scared us into this frenzy along with every one else with threats that gas could jump 20 cents an hour until morning) and waited behind dozens of vehicles to fill the Sequoia's tank at $3.49 a gallon, even if it did take me 45 minutes.

We took our smaller SUV into town this evening and filled up with the 93, we figure if Sheetz is going to run out of gas that is the reason to fill up, not because it's going to be $5.50 by sun up.

With this gas shortage and all you would think there would be less people out and about, but there wasn't.