Swartswood: The Inappropriate Name Tag

Nicknames have always been a part of my world, and I’ve long been fascinated by the way they are ascribed to a person.  By age 12, the funniest nickname I knew was for an older kid named Thomas, whom my cousin had dubbed “Scro-Tom,” thus ruining the name for me from that day on.  By 13, I was aware that some friends no longer expected to hear their given names from anyone but parents and teachers.  Spaz.  Helmet.  Spock.  Moo.  Whether you had a nervous twitch, anchorman hair, anchorman hair with big ears, or were a developing girl raised on a dairy farm, there was little a person could do to reclaim their given name.  They had been labeled, and like it or not, labels are sticky and sometimes take years to wear off.  To this day I still answer “fine, and yours?” when someone asks, “Hey, Orphan, how was your weekend?”

At Swartswood, my favorite nickname was a sleeper, assigned to Craig Litts at birth, and awakening the first day I saw his name tag.  The thick plastic name tags distributed by the Park Service were a signal to the public that if they had a question, you could help.  They were bright red with engraved white letters, and displayed the first letter of a person’s first name followed by the full last name of the wearer. 

Mine would have read “S. WHEELING,” but only employees who were expected to interact with the public were required to display theirs above their left breast pocket.  Since I was expected to interact with the public’s discarded picnic leftovers, I was exempt, but Craig Litts was a Junior Ranger.  He spoke to the public every day, which is why every day he pinned a piece of thick plastic with “that word” on his shirt and hoped no one would notice. 

We noticed.  EVERYONE noticed.  With most nicknames, once we got over the initial laughter, life would go on and we’d go on with it.  But Craig’s name was a gift, because while WE had long since gotten used to it, HE met new people every day.  Each day while roaming the park with our garbage bags, we might see the eyes of another sweaty patron widen a little before stifling a laugh and nudging his wife, who would blush and pretend to cough.

The next summer, Craig didn’t return to his seasonal post as a Junior Ranger.  One of my friends heard a rumor that he’d taken a job at the Shop-Rite, where people called him Litts-terine.  The name tags at Shop Rite only displayed the employee’s first name, so Craig accepted the new title cheerfully enough.  He had started the mouthwash habit while working closely with the public at Swartswood, so nobody would have an excuse to pick on him for having bad breath.