I never really had a nickname, not one that stuck anyway. When I was in elementary school at Sylvania, kids loved to correlate my name with that of our fourth grade teacher – Nel B. Steel. Often my classmates would giggle and yell, “Neal be still.”
But a lot of my classmates had the coolest nicknames. Anthony Maxwell was called “Max.” It was not only an abbreviation of his last name, but also because he could bench press a small village. Tony Shrader was “Tiger” and Chris Johnson was “Floyd.” Really cool.
Heck, even some of our teachers out staged me with supercool nicknames like Ardath Grizzell, whom the students called “Grizzly” and Billy Jack Lee, whom the kids called “Frog.” I would have gladly settled with one of those animal names, but no, nothing.
One summer, before going back to college in the fall, I worked at Game Time. I was surprised to learn that everyone who worked on the floor there went by a nickname. I don’t think I ever knew anyone’s real name. I remember “Sarge”, “Radio,” “Spanky”, and this very slim guy they called “Foot” because his first day on the job he wore steel-toes boots that were five sizes too large. I was only there for a short time and they never came up with a nickname for me.
My little sister, Denise, has one. Growing up she was always called “Dinky” and when she finally moved back to this area, after having lived away for about 20 years, everyone here still called her that. I had four uncles on my mom’s side: Newt, Bunt, Poss, and Doodle. Don’t ask me their real names.
Also on my mom’s side were my cousin Shorty, Aunt Sis, and Aunt Toon, and on my dad’s side we had Aunt Boots. Come to think of it, we had a lot of female relatives who went by “Sis” and male relatives who were known simply as “Junior.”
I only remember having one nickname and it was bestowed upon me right out of high school when I worked at the Shell Car Wash. It was “Gremlin.” I guess it kind of fit. They were short, loud, destructive, and ate and drank everything they could find. Thank goodness it was only one person who called me that. I won’t tell you who it was, but I was very surprised to move back to Fort Payne and find out he’s now the chief of police.
I guess I just never had any outstanding characteristics that lent themselves to good nicknames. Surely we can come up with something now with a big balding head and dull sloping cranium. I got it – Neanderthal Neal.