Well, only one kid so far, but there will be more.
I’ve been babysitting my friends’ son since he was a teeny infant. He’s now 20 months old and is starting to parrot everything said in his presence. Until yesterday, his parents always referred to me by my first name around him, but now it’s “Mrs. Gazer.” I’ve said that it would be fine with me if he calls me “Aunt Star” (well, the real life equivalent), but I think his dad has strong feelings about only siblings getting to be called Aunt or Uncle. And I’m pretty sure it’s the dad who has a thing about Mr./Mrs – I know it’s because he wants his kids to be respectful, which I think is a good thing.
Thing is, I really don’t like being called Mrs. Gazer, at least not by people I know so well. I mean, his parents were in our wedding. It feels waaaay too formal, and no one calls me that. No one even calls my mother-in-law that; it’s just not us. Also, I know that with my parents’ friends, if we called them aunt or uncle, we eventually switched to their first names when we got old enough. If we called them Mr. & Mrs., it always stayed that way. I’d really like my friends’ kids to eventually call me by my first name. And I understood from a very young age which aunts & uncles were actually relatives and which weren’t.
Is there another option? I mean, I’m not going to stop being friends with them just because I don’t want to be called Mrs., but it’s going to irritate me every time. I can respect that only real aunts get to be called aunt, but is there another affectionate yet respectful title I could suggest?
With the closest friend I had (well, all of both families were friends), his parents insisted on being called by their first names, for as long as I can remember. I think that can be perfectly fine, but if his parents’ insist on something more formal, I’d say let them have their way.
You might consider going by “Miss Star.” I have noticed a trend for this…that kids use the honorific “Mr” or “Miss/Mrs,” but with an option of the first name instead of the last.
Here’s my one piece of wisdom (?) to offer your friends. My son grew up calling our close friends Stan and Gwen. (In fact, at one time, he referred to them as a unit: Stanangwen ).
I was always worried about the respect thing. But as he grew up, he figured it out. There were people who wanted to or should be be addressed as Mr. or Mrs./Ms., including teachers, and there were people who were fine with being addressed by their first names.
He adresses his friends’ parents as Mr. or Mrs. So-and-so. He addresses the adults he has grown up with by the names they’ve established as OK. My husband’s college roommate is
“Fred,” not “Mr. Smith.” My sister is “Uncle Buck.”
If he calls you “Star” now, that does’t mean he’ll, for the rest of his life, assume that it’s OK to address everyone on a first-name basis.
I refer to myself as Auntie Sandra when I’m speaking to my friends’ kids and that’s what they call me. Hopefully your other friends won’t be so formal about who is/isn’t allowed to be called Auntie!
When we lived in the South, it was just a given that I was called Miz Kitten by the children of close friends. Didn’t confuse any familial relationships by using Aunt, and still gave an honorific for my adulthood, but allowed them to use the first name without too much familiarity.
I’ll second the suggestion of “Mrs. [firstname].” Not too familiar, not too formal. I grew up with very sociable parents, always throwing parties, and I called a lot of their friends that way: Mr. Ted, Ms. Diane, etc.
And for some reason there were a few I called by their last names only, e.g., “Hogan.” It seemed natural at the time.
Then again, my dad still calls me “Tiger” (I’m 35), so maybe we’ve just got strange ideas of nomenclature in my family.
I grew up in the South and Miss [firstname] works great for that purpose as others have said. You probably can guess that Mrs. [firstname] is not the way to go.
At our church, the children are gently encouraged to call non-family adult women “Miss First Name.” (As in, adults refer to other adults that way, but if the kids don’t use the Miss, no one freaks out or corrects them.) Men are called Mr. First Name. I like it. It’s respectful but not super-formal. I’d encourage our children, if we had them, to use the Miss/Mr. First Name system.
Not being from the South, I can’t speak from personal experience, but I believe the “Miss First Name” is a Southern tradition. On preview, I see that’s confirmed by Shagnasty.
Myself, though, I tend to use Sir and Ma’am with adults I don’t know well. Being a little too polite has not yet gotten me into trouble.
My first thought was Miss Star as well. I’m from Minnesota, but grew up in Kentucky, and think that this is the best possible compromise.
As an aside, I only have one adult acquaintence who makes the kids call her “Mrs. Peterson.” I’m not comfortable with that. Our kids refer to all our other friends by their first names, we reserve “Mrs.” for teachers. I’m fine with Mrs. as a sign of respect. I’m not a fan of age being the automatic determinent of who gets that respect. I avoid her - almost exclusively for this reason.
I don’t understand the idea that someone should have respect for me because I’m older than they are. I’m Julie. I’m Julie if you’re two and I’m Julie if you’re 200.
Well, if you’re 200, you can call me whatever you want, 'cause you obviously have super DNA that will kick my ass.
Thanks for the ideas – somehow, though, I think pseudoaunt is currently beyond the little tyke’s vocabulary.
So, now the trick is: how do I broach this with them? I mean, they just sort of started doing it; I didn’t really have a say in the matter. Which also kind of bugs me, since it’s my name.
Maybe I’ll just say, “Y’know, I understand what you’re trying to do, but I really don’t want to be Mrs. Gazer to him. Can we come up with a different name for me?” and go from there.
I always called my parents’ friends by their firstnames. My friends’ parents, too. The two often ended up being the same, anyway.
A few years back, my aunts and uncles decided to ask us to start calling them by firstname. Those cousins who were present stared at them… looked at each other… and chorused “naaaah, that’s weird!” Aunt said they’d been getting the same reaction from every nephew, but that’s because we’d been calling them Aunt or Uncle for 30 years - something that’s been done that long isn’t going to change easily.
While I’m sympathetic to your gripe, especially if you are seldom called Mrs. Gazer and don’t really want to be, there is another side to this story. Are the parents of this child supposed to ask each friend for his or her preference and remember them so that the child can learn to address them as Miss Dangerosa, Mrs. Peterson, Julie, Pseudouncle Brian, Auntie Sandra, etc.?
While it is tempting from the point of view of the friend to say yes, it is much easier for the parent to pick one form of address and apply it uniformly to all their friends, except to those who are real sticklers for another form, or whose degree of relationship makes another form appropriate.
Miss Firstname works for me, and I’ve been Aunt Eureka to a 3 year old who I’m not related to (And yes, it was Aunt Eureka and not my real name). And I don’t mean to be preachy. Your suggested comments sound like a good starting point to me. Unilaterally imposing your will on them is as bad as them unilaterally imposing their will on you.
I grew up in Florida and that’s what we did. Miss First Name or Mister Last Name. I ran into one of my childhood friends recently and still called her mother Miss “First Name” even though I’m an adult with kidlets of my own.
It combines quite nicely the familiarity of being a friend’s mom along with the honorific that they’re still an adult and not to be called by just the first name, like they were a friend. They’re not.
That’s part of my problem with “Mrs. Peterson.” She is a very casual friend of ours (like we see her once every few years) and expects a special form of address from EVERY OTHER one of our friends. Most of who are actually called “Owen’s Mom” and not by their first names (if they have kids).
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