If you've ever known a Gemini person (and chances are good you
have, since they seem to know everyone), you've probably noticed
their fondness for nicknames. The Mercury-ruled are staggeringly
adept at using just a word or two to sum up an entire human being.
One of my favorite examples is the character Sawyer from the
television series Lost. Especially in earlier seasons,
Sawyer - a roguish conman - demonstrated a hilarious, if often
unkind, penchant for nicknames. The most memorable were addressed
to Hurley, the sweetest and most supersized of the castaways,
whom Sawyer once addressed as "deep dish." As a bit
of a Chicago style pizza myself, I got a kick out of that - though
if I met a Sawyer in real life I'd be liable to pop him one. A
little too much baggage there.
For as we all know too well, nicknames are the ammunition of
choice in the adolescent war on self-esteem. "Sticks and
stones may break my bones, but names can never hurt me,"
was the favored incantation to ward off nasty nicknames. But who
were we kidding? Nasty nicknames hurt - not just because they
often called attention to our most embarrassing physical characteristics.
They hurt because they were used to define us by those characteristics,
to reduce us to a set of qualities that, more often or not, were
out of our control.
It's not just nicknames that threaten to pigeonhole us. The
names we're given at birth don't just tell us what we're called,
but who we are. They reveal something about the family into
which we're born, and about our place in it. Family legend holds
that on the muggy August afternoon when I made my Planet Earth
debut, my mother - worn out from a fourth and unwelcome pregnancy
- handed me to my great aunt and commanded, "Name her."
The name that dear relative gave me is noteworthy for a couple
of reasons. First, I'm the only one of my siblings who was not
named after anybody else. Unlike my brothers and sister, named
for family members, close friends, and in one instance actor Kirk
Douglas, I'm no one's namesake. Second, I wasn't even named after
the month in which I was born, but perversely, another month entirely.
There's something about my name - about me - that refuses to add
up.
Being named April when I was born in August set me up for a lifetime
of impertinent questions such as, "Why didn't they name you
August?" (How should I know? Take it up with Aunt Charlotte.)
Still, I like my name. I like my free agent status in the namesake
leagues, and I enjoy being a walking non sequitur. My name suits
me… or perhaps I grew to suit it.
Naming anything - a person, a pet, a book - is a delicious, creative,
and powerful experience, a chance to step into Mercury's winged
shoes. By naming something, we define it. We tell the world
what it is, before it gets a chance to declare itself on its own
terms. It's the ultimate branding maneuver, as well as the acme
of the self-fulfilling prophecy. My husband found this out when
he named our cat. We hadn't even been properly introduced to the
kitten with the slightly mangy hair sticking out in all directions
when Jonny said, "Let's take a closer look at that spikey
one." Now seven years old, Spike has a sleek, smooth coat;
but he also has the sharpest, spikiest claws known to man or beast,
and isn't particularly careful about sheathing them.
Just living up to his name.
So why are Mercury, and Gemini, associated with naming? I suspect
it has to do with Hermes, Mercury's Greek counterpart and the
god of boundaries and thresholds. Astrological Mercury symbolizes
the delineation of our personal boundaries, clarifying where we
begin and the rest of the world ends. Few items in our biographical
satchel contain as much power as our name to set us apart as distinct
from others.
I've known a number of people, all women, who have legally changed
their names for reasons other than marriage. One told me she changed
her name because she wished to distance herself from the family
who gave her that name. Another wanted a unique, creative moniker;
yet another simply claimed that she didn't identify with her name
- "I'm not that person." They took the reigns of
Mercury's power and chose names that told the world a new story
about who they are. I applaud such efforts at personal rebranding.
Renaming yourself can be disorienting to everyone who knows you
- but of course, that's part of the point.
And part of the point of Gemini itself lies in shape shifting.
Sometimes, as this Gemini season reminds us, turning your life
around is simply a matter of throwing off your persona and constructing
a new one from scraps of memory and imagination. So the Gemini
New Moon is a good time to think about what you call yourself
- not just your name, but your titles: mother, son, wife, CEO.
And most of all, to rethink the secret names you call yourself,
some of which - like playground nicknames - probably aren't very
nice. Names like loser, slacker, underachiever, fat, ugly, dumb.
Even if you don't always come out on top, even if you've put on
a few pounds and gotten a bad haircut, even if you didn't score
as well as you'd have liked on your SATs - Gemini hastens to reassure
you, You're not just one thing. As much as impish Mercury
likes the challenge of reducing us to just a few words, even he
doesn't insist that those words remain static.
The truth is, no one adjective, no one name, could possibly
contain you. You're not your failures. You're not your successes.
You're not the name your family gave you, or the cruel nicknames
you were given on the schoolyard. At this liminal, magical New
Moon, remember everything else that you are. Imagine yourself
differently, and give that imagining a bright and joyful name
all its own. It's never too late to be someone new.
