A Name

I’ve never really liked my name. I don’t hate it, but I don’t love it. With that said, I couldn’t tell you what I wished I were named instead. 

I could tell you the fake names I’ve given people: Delilah to Starbucks baristas back in seventh grade, whilst putting on a British accent with my best friend. Hawkeye to my poetry friends, an inside joke. Or Danielle to taxi drivers when I’m bored, fabricating all kinds of details of my life to fill up the cab’s roomy silence.

Countless times, my mother has told me she fully intended to name me Eve — but my dad squashed that dream, arguing for the name, Cassie. They compromised on Kasey, which hardly seems like a compromise to me. 

Admittedly, I think I prefer Eve. Eve is otherworldly; it lives, it gives, and it breathes. Eve, as in the evening. Eve, as in the day before something grand.

Eve is one resounding syllable. Both letters require the vocal cords to vibrate, so you feel the full thrill of its mythos hum through your throat. Eeeveee. 

When I think of Eve, I think of someone pale, bewildered, and beautiful. Of course, religious texts have informed this idea. I feel emphatic for that Eve, obsessed with the tragedy that becomes her. I think back to grad school, reading Paradise Lost by John Milton: my grad school professor impassioned by Adam and Eve’s final separation scene:

“from her Husband’s hand her hand / Soft she withdrew” (385-6).”

No matter how many times I read it over, the scene guts me as if it were the first time. It underscores the ending of Adam and Eve’s innocence: a harmony of which they will never fully know again. Their final division emphasized right down to the line break: not a hard and fast split, but a soft and slow uncoupling. 

I remember my professor pantomiming this action, slowly sliding her hands apart for us to watch. I felt all of us poets quietly yearn, in that moment, for Eve to not let go. For her to reach her hand back out to him — as God does in The Creation of Adam. But she doesn’t do that.

For this reason, I think this name is hopelessly romantic: tinged with longing, regret, desire, and intimacy. It holds the weight of every heartbreak that would ever exist on earth. It’s with fault. 

I don’t quite think of myself as so complicatedly beautiful and tragic as Eve. But I’d prefer it to Kasey, the name that’s always felt a little distant from me.

Kasey doesn’t ring any bells, certainly not with a K. At least the letter K looks wonderful as a charm suspended on a dainty chain. But most people think of my name with a C, like Casey Jones or Casey at the Bat (or most unfortunately, Casey Anthony).

Casey is not the same as Kasey at all. The Caseys of the world are happy-go-lucky, in my mind. They play soccer, love the color blue, and drink draft beer. They own large dogs, hiking boots, and run-down cars. Perhaps a rusty pick-up truck or a 2004 Volvo. They have a general charm about them. An airiness or a realness that draws people in. A tomboyishness. A roughness.

Notice how many horror/thriller movies include people named Casey: Drew Barrymore’s character in Scream, Anya Taylor Joy’s character in Split, or Abigail Breslin’s character in The Call. The popularity of the name in this genre, at least in my opinion, is due to its impression. Caseys seem like even-keeled people — people you’d want in a difficult situation. Casey is the ultimate final girl: she’s resilient, intelligent, and brave.

The name, Casey, means brave. It’s Irish Gaelic for Cathasaigh, which means to be vigilant in war. Casey is also a true gender-neutral name, not imposing the typical expectations we cast on names. For the most part, it escapes assumptions that names like Emma or Bridget — or Connor or Brad — do not.

I’ve hardly met many Caseys in my life. There was one boy in middle school, though. And for a brief moment, we had an ongoing joke that we should date and become a couple that shares the same name. It didn’t transpire — we were friends who eventually grew into strangers, as time tends to reveal.

In high school, some of my friend’s Gen X parents would refer to me as KC and the Sunshine Band. I didn’t mind this reference so much; but KC is not quite Kasey, either.

My name seems unwilling to take the shape of anything sensible. Things don’t really come to mind other than my own unique experiences, which could be a great thing, but is also immensely stressful in its own way.

They say that people tend to look like their names, or that certain names attract certain life paths. Studies have repeatedly shown that Helen is a common name among librarians; Katie is a common name among writers; Louisa is a common name among journalists; and Erik is a common name among stuntmen.

I hardly ever meet the Kaseys of the world. Occasionally, I’ll meet a Kaycie —they’re usually bubbly, bright, and funny. The Kaseys I’ve met are a bit more reserved: witty, serious, studious. But I don’t know if that would be the world’s general connotation.

Why does it matter so much what my name means or doesn’t mean to me? Recently, I’ve been working on writing projects that are calling some new insecurities about my name. I’ve imagined how K A S E Y might look on a book cover … which to me looks like a questionable stick-and-poke tattoo. It lacks the maturity of a grown-up name, I guess, in my mind.

I’ve considered dropping the name and going the initial route — K. Dugan or K. Blagojevic. I think I’m more partial to K. Dugan, but then what is even the point? (And K.L. Dugan feels a bit too refined, for my taste.)

I could take on an alias, but then comes the question of what alias would fit best? And do I really want no connection to my creations? That instinct seems wrong. I feel like sometimes all I am are my creations — unhealthy as that may be. My characters feel real to me, as though I might turn a corner and see them sitting on a bench, untangling their wired headphones from their pocket. The settings, the details, the stories I’ve written … they’re all taken out of the context of my life. 

To name things is to love things. To breathe life into them. My husband doesn’t say my name often; usually, he relies on nicknames or pet names when he addresses me. Once in a while, he will drop the full weight of my name into a sentence. It always surprises me. I don’t know if it’s because my name feels like my heart, which belongs to him (and his, mine). Or if what rattles me is the name itself, a mirror suspended before me. 

Have you ever deeply stared into a mirror? Not at your superficial, surface-level self: not the beauty marks or scars or shape of your nose. But at your existence — the realization that you are  a fragile, temporary being with a brief time on this planet. 

It produces acute disassociation, in my experience. So I don’t do it often. My whole life, I’ve had some anxiety about what I am and why I’m here and who I’ll be. Nothing’s really changed except the surface: new beauty marks, new scars. (At least I’ve grown into my nose.)

If I had to make assumptions, Kasey is … polka dots, the color red, a plate of cheese and grapes. It’s reading by a nightlight, drinking a subpar cup of coffee. It’s laundry everywhere, unopened mail, and a made bed. Kasey is always thinking, always writing, always curious. Unafraid to tell people that she loves them. Afraid of the dark, though. And dentists. And that one movie that won’t be named. She likes little trinkets — buttons and gems and stickers. She dislikes yogurt. She hates yogurt. She loves rain and the idea of kissing in the rain. She loves sandwiches and going to the library. She has very long hair that gets tangled in the wind. She feels tangled-up, most of the time, in everything.

Mostly, Kasey is a perfectly alright name.