Sonia/Sonia

*Update- I left off the fact that I was constantly teased by kids calling me Sonia Lasagna.
NOW as an adult Movin' dad has found great humor in calling me San-Jonia. (I do not like that) In Sanjaya humor!


Anonymity?

I guess not anymore...we're now officially on a first name basis.

As my profile reveals, I am a native born Texan. I do not have a southern accent because reality has placed me in the midwest for the last 11 years. To be perfectly honest, if you were to ask me today I would say that I never really had a Texan accent. But then there are those camcorder tapes of me with my two little boys, and even though I was in Tennessee at that time there was a twang.

I actually sounded like a complete different person. Chatting away with Texan relatives, I fall right back in and out of the southern belle lingo with a blink of an eye.

My children often say, "Who did you just talk to, because your talkin' country again?"

Here's the thing, and I am not sure I can do this post justice because it really has to do with the pronunciation of my name. But here it goes:

My father, who was born in Mexico named me Sonia (SOE- NYAH)

I was raised in Texas with many caucasian southern twang friends.
They always addressed me as Sonia (SAHN-yah)

When asked what my name was I would always say (SAHN-YA) After all that is what people had always called me since I was in the 1st grade.

All of my relatives would call me (SOE-NYAH) All of my friends (SAHN-YA)

NEVER CAME UP FOR QUESTION! Not once ever! No one ever asked how do you say your name? No one ever asked which way do you prefer? There were always questions about my last name (but that would be too much nakedness on my anonymity) So we wont go there.
There were millions of questions about my lack of a middle name! I was even sent home in 7th grade by my English teacher because she thought I was being a smart aleck when I said I didn't have a middle name. My dad chose to eliminate the middle name because of the length of our last name. Of course I made sure that I put much thought into my children's names and their middle names. Yes, they all 4 have a middle name!

When Movin' Dad moved me from Texas to Illinois, no question. Then we headed up to Michigan. EVERY PERSON I MET ASKED ME THE SAME QUESTION!

- "Is it Sonia or Sonia?"

- "It doesn't matter, I will answer to either!"

- "But which do you prefer?"

- "It truly doesn't matter!"

- "But I want to call you by your name."

- "OH for Pete's sake, I honestly answer to either. My dad named me SOE-NYAH but growing up in Texas everyone just called me SAHN-YA because the mexican accent was a little too much for them."

- "So which one do you prefer?"

sigh, sigh ,sigh

- "Well then, we will just call you SEWN-ya"

It kind of made me think that the language arts dept in Michigan schools must rate very high because no one has ever questioned the rules of language on how I pronounce my name. My immediate group of friends in Michigan decided to just call me Sasha! When I was in Illinois I had a woman ask me, who has turned out to be a very good friend of mine and I told her that she is the first person outside of Michigan to pose that question to me. She said. "I was born and raised in Michigan."

Now in Wisconsin, no questions.

Since you all live in so many different parts of the country I would be interested in hearing if you would question what to call me.