Twenty some odd years ago I changed my name. Nothing too radical — from Debbi to Debra — but it was a step I’d wanted to take for years. At the time I was swimming in Debbis and Debbies, Debs and a Debi or two. My first and closest friend here in Michigan was a Debbie whose next door neighbor was also a Debbie. I’d go to the doctor and when the nurse called out “Debbi” four of us stood up. Debbie and I talked for months about having a Debbie party where we’d serve.. you guessed it — Little Debbie Snack Cakes. 

When I hit thirty  that was it.  I was old enough to choose, and insist on, the name I would answer to — Debra, my given name. Debra. Elegant. Mature. I couldn’t wait to shed the cutsie, perky, diminutive that had stuck to me like dried cotton candy all those years.  

My loved ones fell in line — parents, grandparents, my husband, sisters. Even  my closest Debbie friend.  My children have never known me as Debbi.  If I introduce myself to you and you respond, “Hello, Debbi” you will be corrected swiftly and firmly.  I don’t even know myself as Debbi any more. 

Then last month three college friends and I got together. We’ve been gathering every summer or every other summer for a few years now. Sometimes they remember and call me Debra, other times they forget. No one knows you like your college friends do. We slipped right back into being together as seamlessly as we used to bop into one another’s dorm rooms.

The weekend was a balm. We had come together to celebrate the purchase of Donna’s first home, a beautiful 1920’s colonial with hardwood floors, leaded glass doors and Pewabic tile in the foyer. Our lives have taken different paths. One of us never married. One married late. One entered the convent and subsequently left to marry and raise a family. The youngest of our children turns ten next month. Me, the wild woman who swore she would never wed, was the first to walk down the aisle.  I’m the crone, the parent with perspective, having launched two into the post-college world. We went out for ‘za, drank plenty of wine and talked hormone replacement therapies. 

Back in college we kept “The Book.” In it we wrote everything that happened to us — late nights and early mornings, crushes and break-ups. Professors who were mashers and professors who were heart throbs. We wrote poetry and sob stories, jokes and protests. Rereading the pages I was stunned to hear my “voice.” The writer in me was right there. Tucked inside The Book’s pages were spent corsage flowers, a wonderful photograph of Paul Newman (fellow Kenyon alum), and a sketch someone on our hall did of us. Uncanny how even today you could pick each of us out from that thirty year old sketch. Way in the back was a letter from my father, dated September 1977 assuring me that I would indeed find a job after graduation. 

That weekend my friends called me Debbi and I didn’t correct them. I welcomed the sound of the name, the lightheartedness the memory of her evoked. I welcomed the sound of Debbi, welcomed the memories of being in college when all that really mattered was learning. My friends called me Debbi, returning to me a self I treasure, a self so wonderful to meet once again.