My parents wanted to give me a name I could grow into. So I was named after Joshua Nkomo, the late vice president of Zimbabwe. In the '70s, when I was born, Zimbabwe was still a British colony called Rhodesia. Mr. Nkomo was a major figure in the black nationalist movement of the country before it was liberated in 1980, which involved taking part in guerilla warfare for almost 30 years. That's about all I know about the history of my namesake, who died in 1999.
My day-to-day experience of my name is so cushy, so easy, that I used to think I did my namesake a disservice. After all, I never had to pick up a gun to earn my name. I suppose the biggest obstacle I've faced is trying to get people to pronounce it correctly. You see, my name is pronounced differently than Mr. Nkomo's. If I were in Zimbabwe, I'd be called nnnnnnkomo, sort of like I was yummy. But here, in the mouths of my parents and loved ones, I am pronounced Nuh-komo.
From time to time I come across the culturally literate who, despite having heard me say it, continue to bastardize my name into its original form. In high school, I got so tired of explaining how to pronounce it, how to spell it, the entire history of it, that I stopped using my name altogether. I called myself Mo and left it at that.
Nowadays, I don't really care. People I know know what to call me. And when I meet someone who says my name the wrong way, I don't choose to feel unworthy. Instead I realize that I am my own person, with a different name to grow into, then correct the mispronunciation and move on.
