20-40-60 Etiquette---Jimmy or Jim?

Do you have an etiquette question for 20-40-60? Email me at helen.wallace@cox.net.

YOU ASK! WE ANSWER! YOU DECIDE!

By Callie Gordon, Lillie-Beth Brinkman, Helen Ford Wallace

QUESTION: I have an etiquette question, on how to handle a situation regarding my name. I am a grown man, older than 50, and my legal first name is Jimmy, which is what my friends and family call me and what I prefer.

My irritation comes from meeting new people, introducing myself, saying my name as “Jimmy,” and then listening to them call me “Jim.” Sometimes, they introduce me to someone else as “Jim.” This is annoying.

What is a good way to handle this without making it an overly blown issue? When I introduce myself to someone as “Jimmy,” that is what I expect to be called, not Jim.

CALLIE’S ANSWER: Why don’t you say, in the nicest way possible, “it is actually Jimmy. Nice to meet you.” After you correct the person, I am sure they will apologize and you should graciously say that ‘it happens all the time.’ Don’t forget to smile!

LILLIE-BETH’S ANSWER: This happens to me frequently. People assume when I say “Lillie-Beth” that I must mean “Lillie,” but I’ve never gone by that: When someone calls me that, I visualize the “Beth” part of my name in ruins at the bottom of a page after falling off the line. The hyphen is still up high, barely hanging on with the “Lillie-” part.