“OH MY GOD. Is your name really covid???” 

I get that at Target from time to time, because I have to wear this badge of shame on my left chest bearing my birth name, and yeah, people are assholes. I have yet to come up with a good response. Oh, here’s one (way too late and I will never ever say this): “OH MY GOD is your name fucking Karen???????????”

SO yeah.

Some people are calling it the age of COVID. Well from here on out, I call it the age of C0HAVIT. 

Whatever age it is, it’s the perfect storm for ballooning my confused emotional rollercoaster of delusions of grandeur and intense self-loathing. Now is my time to shine. Now is my moment for FAME. 

“Its koh-hah-VEET, you see,” I say quietly.

I am really starting to understand how people with stigmatized names feel when they have to do anything in life. It’s like people think they know what you’re about before you even speak, or that all they’d ever see in you is a joke or a stereotype. It is extremely dehumanizing. I want to run away and hide sometimes when people try to pronounce my name or ask me it’s origins. I already had this problem before, but now it has come to the forefront of my life. It’s time to face my name head on: I have always hated it, how I myself can’t even pronounce it sometimes (since it is Hebrew and I don’t even speak Hebrew), how it just doesn’t feel like me, how I cringe when people try to accentuate the chhhhhhh phlegm sound in the middle way too much. My name is the source of deep shame and feelings of being an outsider looking in. I feel that I am a white American, but then when someone asks my name and then proceeds with, “What’s your ethnicity?” I want to throw up. 

“I’m Jewish,” I say flatly. “Oh,” they say, sounding disappointed, “I thought it was French…” 

To anyone with an “ethnic” (non-white-sounding) name in suburban America: stay strong and stay yourself and don’t let anybody break down your self-image. Just because they don’t know who you are and they are very worried and uncomfortable by the contradiction of it all, doesn’t mean you don’t know who you are now and where you came from. Regardless of how you feel about your name, it is part of what makes you you. I wish I could just listen to myself when I give this advice. It’s hard out here though. People are mean.

At my last job at a hospital, I left because the people there would make fun of me (my hair, my name, anything), to my face and behind my back. Not to mention they treated me like their little b**ch whose only purpose in life was to clean up after them. At the time, I felt that I had to clean instead of do the actual job description because I was new and didn’t want to lose my job. I quit 3 months in. 

YOU CAN ALWAYS LEAVE, PEOPLE. Never, ever stay in a situation that makes you feel bad about yourself. I felt so bad about myself that I went to the emergency room for “appendicitis” (which I didn’t have) during that time. My emotional stress had manifested as intense bodily pain. ANYWAY. I maintain that this bullying was out of jealousy because I am just too awesome for them!!!!  *Insert shaky middle finger*

So anyway, on to the next! How the f**k do I explain in an interview that I was called “Covid” at that job and mocked and pushed around and it has a lasting effect on my psyche that can never be undone, and that’s why I quit after 3 months? 

*Me on a phone interview.* Okay okay, breathe, just remain professional.. no no don’t cry. please don’t cry. you’ll get through this interview. Just say: “the culture wasn’t a good fit for me.” 

“What do you mean by that?” the interviewer asks sharply. “Well, uh you see…I had to clean a lot, which I didn’t mind because it was important to everyone’s safety! Of course I respect other people’s safety and that was definitely a priority and I was happy to be a good worker and contribute to the very serious cause we are facing… no but um what I mean is that the people there weren’t very… friendly.”

In that confused moment of explaining the situation, I felt like it was all my fault that I got bullied because I couldn’t try hard enough to fit in and I was some weirdo-freak incapable of being liked by coworkers. Who would want to hire that type of person??

I proceeded to bomb the interview. Everything I said after that was tainted with tones of guilt for being bullied and an intense emotional dissociation from all my past accomplishments and self-worth. So any achievement I highlighted, any proud moment I shared sounded like a fucking funeral speech. Good stuff, maybe I’ll still get the job because I am just that awesome. I didn’t get the job, surprise surprise. 

Anyway. I am about to apply to another job and I am considering changing my name just before then. But no. That would be weak and pathetic. I know! Instead, just make a stupid joke at the start of the interview so you seem self-aware and affable. That’ll do the trick. 

*Walks into interview.*

Me: “Hi, its nice to meet you, my name is… No, not covit. Yeah, no, its all good. I know, it kinda sounds like COVID right??lol. I had the name first, haha the global pandemic can suck my d***! 

Interviewer: “um…”

Me: “Wow. I can see how people hate Jews because I sure do hate myself right now! 

“Sorry, too dark?”

Interviewer: “I think we’ve heard enough, thank you… Covaheet. Security!!!”

*gets dragged out of interview by two huge men and is publicly humiliated forever.*

But let’s be real. I would never say those things in person!!! All I would do is have extreme difficulty making eye contact and be on the verge of tears and bite the inside of my lip and forget everything I was ever excited about in life and forget why I am even interested in this job in the first place.

So there you go, dear reader, now you have a way clearer look at my insecurities than you ever wanted, I’m sure. Maybe you can feel better about your cute name now though. I don’t want your pity, by the way, just like, I don’t know…a recognition of my perspective and maybe some air hugz.

I’ll stop talking about myself soon I promise. Just had to get this one off my chest. I have some ideas for satirical stories about America but that just feels like a lot to write about right now when I am in such a funk. 

Me. me. me. me. me memememeememe meme. the end. the story of our generation.