My name by which I am called

I consider it a personal failing of mine that I shy away from argument with people I care about.  Perhaps this is because I do not wish to offend those that I love or maybe it is because I secretly do not believe that people will love me if I make my beliefs known.  Either way I have come to an epiphany I wish to share it.  

I have always considered my favorite books to be dear friends.  I have read L.M. Montgomery's Blue Castle, her Rilla of Ingleside, Patricia C. Wrede's Sorcery and Cecelia, and James Barrie's Peter Pan, religiously several times a year since I was fifteen.  It is a small wonder then that these books which I love so dearly also took part in my name.  Where all my brothers and my sister were named for my parents' parents, I was named for a storybook character: Anne Shirley of Anne of Green Gables.  I was quite young when I realized this and I'm afraid I came to much the same conclusion as my predecessor- "Anne" is a very horrid name, improved only by the small accession that at least it has an "e" at the end.  Still I hated it and a small part of me still does, albeit to a lesser degree since I stopped going by it.  Adding insult to injury my family took on the name of "Annie" as a fitting alternate for "Anne."  I supposed I liked it well enough once but as I grew I realized that the name no longer fit.  "Annie" was the girl I once was and I had long since resolved never to truly be an "Anne."  Thus began my search for a less childish name.  


I might have gone by any other part of my name but "Marie" and "Nicole" were out of the question.  Marie was too close to Mary Elizabeth, Maria, Mary-Pat, Marilyn, and of course, our one lone Mary.  Nicole was too close to Nicholas, my favorite cousin.  Add in the fact that I once had known a Nicole in grade school who I perfectly loathed and I realized that this name was never going to work along with any nickname connected to it.  This left me with a variation of "Anne."  But we already had an Anna as well as an Aunt Anne and an Anya (spelled Aine).  I even tried going by "Annamarie" at one point but someone said it was a veritable slap in the face to my parents not to go by the name that they had given me, and so it seemed that I was doomed to be forever just "Annie".  And then something wonderful happened.


My best friend, Bernie, and I met when we were eleven, but had been writing to one another across the country for a year prior to that.  She lived in Michigan and I in California.  Snail mail was tortuously slow and phone calls were absurdly expensive.  Eventually our mothers gave in and granted us access to that new-fangled contraption, email, with one small requirement.  Our mothers didn't feel it safe for two young girls, children really, to be sending our real names across the Internet.  Obviously middle names would never do because some malicious, brigand, intent upon stealing one or both of us away might still be able to connect us to that.  Thus came about the use of our confirmation names because as good Catholic girls we both had at least one of those.  


Bernie was taking the name "Bernadette" after a humble child saint who had been visited by the Blessed Virgin.  I took the name "Gabrielle" after the Archangel who had first visited the Mother of God to give her the joyous and sorrowful news of the Child she would bear.  Bernie wished to see the word of God fulfilled and I wanted to bring it.  


As years passed I began to go by Gabrielle more and more- soon all my friends had at least heard of my preference for the name as well as most of my family.  And then I began to hear the complaints- how dare I go by a name that had not been chosen for me?  I found it unfair that I should be required to live with a name that was unsuited to me- I had long since stopped being "Annie" in my head, though I never asked anyone to stop calling me that.  The more I went by Gabrielle the more I heard grumbles.  Shortly after my move to Texas I heard more complaints.  Why was I moving so far away from my family?  Why hadn't I gotten married or at least secured a man before graduating?  Why didn't I follow the path laid out by all my relatives and do things as they did?  My mother would say that this is because I have to make all my own mistakes but I don't think that's fair either.  I am my Father's daughter- I chose to go where God called me, move away from my family and take on an entirely different culture, because it was the right thing to do.  I am my Mother's daughter- I help children and parents learn to live and understand their learning and emotional disabilities and find a common ground.  


This morning while waiting for I don't remember what I realized that all these rumors flying around about my lack of happiness and all the recommendations on how to change my life were really all signs of how loved I am.  And then I realized that all these people whom I love wouldn't be complaining so much unless I was disappointing them.  I considered ways I could make them happier but realized that this would only cause me to be less happy, and I learned the hard way that you cannot make someone satisfied with their life.  From this I deduced that if I was making no one else happy with my life choices then I at least should make myself happy.  And my happiness is dependent upon not being known as "Anne".  My happiness is dependent on being at peace with God- being able to sleep at night because I know this is where He wants me.  I cannot be at war with my relations lest I spend all my time being angry and therefore not speaking to them.  I am happy with my role in life- with my work and with my friends- and no matter what anyone says I love my family.  


If you had told me this was the life I was going to be like now two years ago I might have laughed because this was not what I had planned at all.  I planned to be teaching, dating a fabulous guy, and working crazy hours, and maybe have a dog.  I had everything planned and very few things have carried over.  This wasn't my plan at all.  It's better.