Your Name Please?
No doubt, we have all posed or answered this question a number of times throughout our lives. It is our number one identifying factor. We are given monikers at birth then move on without much of a problem with that name. Although there are those who simply hate their identifying label, I happen to quite like mine and find it somewhat unique. The issue I have with my name is not one of dislike but rather frustration. No one can pronounce or spell it correctly. The fact of the matter is, in terms of the widely accepted classification of speech sounds, the pronunciation of my name is all wrong. But, there is a story behind it…
As firstborn, my name was selected as a namesake for two grandmothers—Lela Ann and Cecelia Pauline (Celia was how she was known.) Both names are pronounced as one might suspect—each of these defining labels is phonetically correct. My name, however, is a play on the two names Lela and Celia, combined as Lelia. While most people would be inclined to say the name as Lee-lee-ah, it is actually pronounced Lee-lah.
Now that we have the first name covered, shall we tackle the last? I may not have given input on my first name, but I chose to take my husband’s surname. And, I might add, I am proud to have it. However, as you might well guess, my last name is also not phonetically correct. Most people want to say Pie-et like the word diet, but nope! Piet is spoken as Pee-yet (Dutch origin).
There you have it—the story behind the name and how to pronounce it.
Lelia Piet
Lee-lah Pee-yet.
Where Did I Put Those?
Life is full of hope and purpose. Unless, of course, we somehow misplace it, lose it.
For many, the natural progression of life is scripted, particularly up to the point when we reach our early twenties. Even the few years after are fairly predictable—the baby morphs into a toddler, then moves on into preschool and elementary. Middle school awkwardness is followed by high school drama leading to the exploratory years of training or college with the assurance of a fulfilling career before offering up this opportunity to our offspring.
Though this path may not hold true for everyone, it is the course many parents dream of as their precious newborns are placed into arms for the first time. What does the future hold for their incredible little being, for the person their baby will eventually grow into? Parents witness their children traverse the very same phases they too accomplished years earlier, doling out blessings, expressing awe as the child steps into relationships with the promise of happiness, and then watching the faces of their grown children as they hold their own newborns.
I’m not sure at what point the realization of this circle comes to light, but as I looked back on my progression through those stages and experiences, I was overcome by the surreal feeling of knowing I had completed most of the momentous phases of my life. I’d had my graduations, married my dream guy, birthed my two wonderful boys (now both grown men.) Thus far, my life had been full and happy, powered by hope and purpose.
Still, I wondered—what came next? Had I accomplished what I wanted, what I should have? Were there dreams I had forgotten? Or perhaps, I’d become so busy with the actual act of living I misplaced those long-lost hopes somewhere along the way? Was it possible to still accomplish those aspirations I had clung to earlier in life? Was there still time? Was I going through some sort of mid-life review? A crisis?
Ahh, the discovery of a new phase, another notch in the cog. But I was determined not to be the cliched version of this next move in the progression of life. Having started our family much earlier than most of our peers, my husband and I found ourselves in a unique situation. Still ‘younguns’ as our grandparents liked to say, we had big plans for our future, including all the accomplishments we had yet to make, experiences yet to be had, the travel—lots of travel to places yet to be seen.
And then, as I dug through my self-exploratory phase (don’t slap that mid-life crisis label on me!) I found it. My own dream, the one that had seemed so purposeful, the one I was so hopeful of achieving, the one I buried long ago, bobbed to the surface.
But, I am ahead of myself. To best explain how I stumbled onto my hopes and dreams again, I need to share the circumstance behind my revelation.
A proud graduate of Florida State University, I had yet to use my degree in any professional capacity. My husband and I were hospitality majors. While I’m certain there are couples who do just fine, we decided both of us could not hold the stress of being in such a demanding field of work and maintain a healthy marriage. He was already employed in the industry, and so I landed in retail. We were able to sustain this arrangement until our second son came along. After his birth, I took on a stay-at-home role.
When the boys began attending school on a regular schedule, I started writing. In my youth, I was always creating stories for my younger siblings, but I was surprised to find molding characters, giving them lives and motives, putting words together gave me such a self-gratifying pleasure. While the boys were at school or playing, I wrote. In the early morning hours, I read and edited what I had written the day before. I was committed. Passion fueled my efforts and promoted a feeling of purpose. I was going to tell stories others would read and get lost in, a tale that would take the reader out of their world for a time. In just over two years, I finished a novel—that part was easy. Getting it into the world was another obstacle.
Without success, I strived to have it published. One rejection letter followed another squashing my ambition, crushing the passion I had experienced, stealing away my confidence. The zeal for writing ebbed. Fear of being deemed a failure by family, friends, the parents of my children’s friends, our neighbors left me feeling foolish, and so, I laid down my pen.
I became “too busy” to write. Focusing on all things family gave legitimacy to the excuse of not writing, not trying to put another novel into the world again. I redecorated, organized carpools, helped out neighbors, and volunteered more at the boys’ schools. I took charge of planning family reunions, trips, and outings with friends. I did all I could to be viewed as useful, yet it never seemed enough. I always felt judged for my decision to be at home with the boys and take care of my family. It was a responsibility I wanted and welcomed, but I also resented it. No matter how insignificant or remarkable I believed my actions to be, I couldn’t peel away the feeling of uselessness. Needing to experience a sense of purposefulness again, I decided to join the workforce. It was important to me, however, that I was available to our boys as much as possible, leading me to acquire my teaching license, which would allow my work hours to match the boys’ school hours.
Like creating stories, teaching was something my younger siblings and I played for hours on end during our childhood—me always assuming the role of teacher. I determined that if crafting tales gave me a sense of purpose, then so too would teaching children in a formal setting—and it did until it didn’t.
During my tenure as an elementary school teacher, my husband continued to make his ascent up the corporate ladder. Each rung that took him higher also stole more time from our family. After two years of my husband traveling domestically as well as internationally forty-six weeks a year, we determined the wheel was spinning much too fast. In order to slow it down and give the time back to our kids, back to our family, one of us would need to be home more. No surprise that someone was me, given the huge disparity in our incomes.
Happy to be back at home and once again have proper time to give the boys, I threw myself into trying out new recipes, cleaning, gardening, taking care of those long-neglected projects, but never writing. Reading became my escape; my appetite for words was never satiated, even if I wasn’t the one to put them on paper. Before long, I found myself in the same place I had been before teaching.
Then came the fateful day we learned my husband’s job was obsolete.
For over a year, we lived in doubt, every day waking with hope for news on where we would be next. While my husband performed consulting services and searched for a new opportunity, I busied myself preparing for an inevitable move—clearing out closets and cabinets, readying the house to put on the market, tidying the yard.
Finally, a consulting position my husband had been working turned into a full-time offer, but we would need to move to New York City. After having our lives on hold for over a year, we were suddenly thrust into action. Even though I had been preparing, there was still much to be done. The move I conceptualized was not of the magnitude a move such as this one entailed. All we had acquired over the years had to be downsized. Plans had to be revamped.
The decision was finalized. We were going to make the move to New York City. While the job offer firmly belonged to my husband, I was going to benefit from the relocation as well. New York offered experiences and opportunities not readily available in the other cities in which we had lived.
The energy emanating from the streets laying out the grid was powerfully contagious. Exposure and opportunity to a different way of life, an abundance of culture, arts, and entertainment—the possibilities were as beguiling as the city itself. We were moving to the city known for making dreams come true; the situation couldn’t be more perfect for me to begin the next phase, to seek out those forgotten dreams. I felt confident I was taking a colossal leap towards reclaiming some of my lost ambitions.
And jump, I did.
Everything happened so quickly there wasn’t much time to contemplate such a significant transition, and further facilitating our need for urgency was the start of the school year. The offer came at the end of July, and we were to be in place by the first of September. Though our oldest son would be staying in Knoxville to build his own career, our youngest son had to begin his final two years of high school just after Labor Day. There was much to be done. I ran on adrenaline for at least a month, familiarizing myself with our new neighborhood, exploring Manhattan, learning to manage in a small space again, and organizing it accordingly.
Around the six-week mark, I began to question what we had done. The newness of the city had worn off. I missed our eldest, my friends, and neighbors. The early stages of homesickness invaded my thoughts more and more regularly, leaving me with many doubts about the decision we had made and followed through with. While it had been fun to announce we were going to start over to our friends and family, the statement contained more truth than hyperbole. We had not lived in an apartment in over twenty years, not lived in a new town in over fourteen. Uncertainty rolled in, a thick fog smothering the ambition that had soared just weeks earlier. What would I do with my days while my youngest child was in school and my husband at work? How was I going to meet people? A job seemed the obvious answer—though it didn’t feel right. I still had my son to think of, in a new city, having to start over himself, finding it difficult to adjust to his new school. It seemed important that I not leave him just yet.
Each morning after rousing my son, it became routine for me to brew coffee, stand with mug in hand, gaze out the floor-to-ceiling windows at the world happening on the other side of the glass. Whether gloomy and grey or a brilliant blue day, I found myself thinking about all the people living in such an astonishing city, a city as full of possibilities as it was inhabitants and wondering what these folks did with their days. What job were they heading off to? How did they spend their time? Surely, their days were not as humdrum and tedious as mine. They had to be experiencing more exciting and productive days than I could lay claim to. Did they have friends living here? Were they more comfortable in their surroundings than I seemed to be? Were they achieving their desires, living their dreams?
I wanted to feel passionate about what I did with my time, to feel purpose in performing a skill, an art. I wanted to experience a sense of hopefulness about my goals, and ambitions, and aspirations. But more than anything, I wanted to accomplish something that would touch other people, that would inspire thought and provoke actions by others.
As I stood there, morning after morning, contemplating the lives of others, assigning them jobs, sketching out their family members and significant others, allotting them problems to cloud their days, I realized the joy I felt in creating these fictional worlds for those outside my window. Something began to break open, a fissure allowing the dream to push through, the dream that had held hope and purpose, the dream I had lost sight of so long ago.
My magic looking-glass, displaying one of the world’s most famous cities on the other side, had given me some valuable insight. There would always be the mundane in life no matter what city one lived in, no matter what the occupation or art form one practiced. Disappointment and rejection would always be there, but it only made the realization of joy so much more potent. More importantly for me, however, was the awareness of what it was that gave me hope and a sense of purpose.
I was ready to write again.