My Name Isn’t Holly
By: Ivy Samuel
Tags: This Happened To Me, Group Chat, Humour, Instagram, Ivy

This Happened To Me

My Name Isn’t Holly

But this might be the most self-centred piece I’ve ever written

Photo by Bogdan Locovei on Unsplash

Other than the slight disruption of a global pandemic, the strangest thing that happened to me this year, was the time I was added to an Instagram group chat called ‘Ivy Samuel’. Even thinking about it now, still makes me feel quite odd.

Now, I don’t mean to offend anyone, but my name isn’t your bog-standard basic name. I was one of those kids who went around saying “they don’t do keychains with my name on it” as if it was something to be proud of. I rarely come across other people called ‘Ivy’ let alone a whole group of people who share both my first and second name.

It goes without saying, this shook me to my very core. I never really believed that I was the only person with my name, but they weren’t lying when they said: “ignorance is bliss”. I had been living my whole life obliviously believing that I was somehow special, and being added to that group was just another hurdle 2020 threw at me.

This all happened way back when in March 2020-part-A, and looking back now the only thing that hurts so much more than sort of understanding how it feels to be a ‘John Smith’, is the fact that it was such a wasted opportunity.

It’s not every day your namesake thinks it a good idea to gather you all together in one insta group chat. But you wouldn’t believe the mediocre messages I sent. I think the occasion got to me because the only two messages I sent were a generic “wow, you’ve all got such great names” and “we should probably take over the world”.

WHAT WAS I EVEN THINKING?

The one chance I got to speak to people who understood what it is like to live as a 21st century ‘Ivy Samuel’, and I blew it. I’m so annoyed because if I had my time again, I would’ve done so much more.

I would tell them nostalgic stories, like that time I dressed up as an ‘Ivy tree’ in a school play, or I would ask them some deep hard-hitting questions. The important questions like:

How flattered were you when Beyoncé named her child after us?

Do you wear ‘Ivy Park’? Because despite how sure of myself I might appear, I have nowhere near enough confidence to walk around with my name plastered all over me.

Have you ever eaten at any of the Ivy restaurants? Is there a discount? If not, someone should go sort that out!

Do you attend an Ivy League school? I do and it’s so cool like you wouldn’t even imagine! Ivy at an Ivy League School, what are the chances! I’m just messing, I don’t. I’ve never even been to America.

Have you ever looked up your name on Spotify and fallen in love with a song called ‘Ivy’? I definitely haven’t, and it definitely wasn’t one of my most played songs of 2019. I’m definitely not that self-absorbed.

It’s terribly disappointing that I’ll probably never find the answers to all these great and insightful questions. I am still in the group chat, and most of the others are too, but I don’t even have the courage to send a message in a dead group chat full of people I actually know in real life, let alone a group chat filled with strangers who for all I know might be as weird as me.

All I have to show from that short-lived experience are my two rubbish messages and a damaged sense of self-importance. But there’s also the slight satisfaction I get every time I create a new account somewhere on the internet and I’m able to use my full name as my username without needing to add all the bells and whistles. I do a fist pump in the air wherever I am because I know I’ve beaten all the other members of the ‘Ivy Samuel’ group chat to it. And that’s what helps me sleep at night.