August Challenge # 19- Nicknames I Had or Have

When I was born, I was named Mary (tradition in my mother's family to name the second daughter Mary, a good Irish Catholic thing to do) Jacqueline...to be called Jackie...I don't know where that came from.  My sister who was two and a half years old when I was born, had difficulty saying Jackie so she called me Jay...which stuck to this day!  When I went to college, I thought it would be cool to be Jackie, but that didn't last long...so Jay it is.  I need to mention; I did not know of this tradition until many years after I had my own children....My first daughter is named Mary!!  As is her first (and only) daughter.  And that is how family traditions get altered through the years!

Another nickname I have had in years past was given to me by some of my fellow teachers.  The middle school where I taught had decided to go with the teaming system, whereby a group of approximately 150 kids would share the same core teachers...even though I taught art and had all kids from all teams, the elective teachers were also on teams.  We were all given a group of about 20 for advisory period first thing in the morning.  We were kind of "responsible" for the well-being of those 20...did different activities, helped mentor,  etc.  Anyway, I was the team leader of my team...and I took my job very seriously but with a definite touch of humor!!  As a team leader it was my duty to attend team leader meetings where planning, decision making, activities to be done in advisory, etc were accomplished and then passed on to the teams by us.  I am also very competitive as were some of the other leaders, so I was very encouraging to and persuasive in wanting my team to excel....which we did!  So they lovingly gave me the nickname..."The Big B----"!  One of them even made me a bracelet made of those little alphabet beads spelling out "The Big B"...and I wore it every day with pride!!  When my students would see it, I would explain to them that it stood for  "The Big Boss".  I will leave it to you to decide what you think it stood for!!