You've Been Ladaisi'ed

Otherwise Titled: Ladaisi, an adj.

There has been some (understandable) confusion as to why my blog is called ladaisi, and how to even pronounce said 'word,' so I thought I'd explain it in a post.

<< This is a photo of me right around the time ladaisi happened.  As I'm sitting in a field of (possibly) yellow daisies, it seemed somewhat fitting.

When I was fourteen, my favorite movie was You’ve Got Mail.  It had less to do with the actual premise of the movie than with the fact that it starred Meg Ryan (and let’s face it, who doesn’t love Meg Ryan when playing across from Tom Hanks?).  For whatever reason, I adopted her philosophy of ‘daisies being the friendliest flower,’ and they became my flower.  If ya’ know what I mean.

When I was fifteen, my instant messenger screen name was ‘daisygirl.’  Astonishingly enough, I didn’t even have to tack something like ‘34999751’ onto the end of it.  Sadly, it wasn’t meant to last.  Since I had a horrible memory for passwords and things, I repeatedly got locked out of my own AIM and Hotmail accounts and had to recreate the screen name dozens of times in the process.  Each wildly creative attempt to re-spell the name without destroying the meaning downgraded it a bit more, the worst of which was, I hate to admit, ‘dayseagal.’  Three syllables that may, in fact, sound like the flower but, as one of my IM pals informed me, made him think of seagulls.

By that time I had developed the nickname ‘daisy’ among my internet friends, and the nickname ‘La’ (short for Lauren) among the friends I’d actually met in real life.  In my final attempt to revise the horrid screen name, I mashed both nicknames together and said 'be done with it.' And it sort of stayed with me.

Come to think of it, it could’ve been worse considering all the different nicknames I’ve acquired over the course of 25 years.  For example:

Leia (because they kept insisting I looked like Carrie Fisher from Star Wars).  Laura-Lita-Lily-Keeta-Elan-something about a frog-Hughbert etc. (let’s face it, that was just plain mean.  HANNAH).  Lita (the previous nickname shortened).  Herman Magoota (incidentally my mother called all eight of us kids Herman Magoota - no idea). Ssssssss-Lauren (which was what my Dad called me, what with all the Sabrina’s and Stephanie’s and Sarah’s walking around in the world).  Butter (my little brother couldn’t say Lauren so he opted for butter.  Because … that makes sense).  Bob (or was it Joe?  A pen-pal and I once wrote a lengthy correspondence in which we both used male pseudonyms.  For some reason).  Nerual Hguok (my name backwards – another brilliant correspondence mishap).  Shawty (well hello, it’s obviously because I’m so short and scrappy … or something).  Mocosita (I may have had a bit of an attitude problem.  This was occasionally swapped out for its less-appealing counterpart: brat).  Mariposa (from the kids in the barrio because I had a temporary butterfly tattoo).  L (what Tim calls me most).  Babe (I call Isaac ‘babe’ and he recently started saying it back to me.  Well, that and Wauren).

On the whole, I think I came off rather well.  I mean, my blog could've been called Butter and then who would read it.  And anyway, I've sort of come to love ladaisi as a personal adjective.  I’ve also considered using it as a verb.  You’ve been ladaisi’ed. 

(Incidentally, if you had been ladaisi’ed, what do you suppose it means?)