Everyone who asks my name gets curious. Some say, there’s got to be a story there. 

And, there is: my name is the result of a miscommunication between my parents, who were, it must be said, the world's worst communicators. It is no wonder I do what I do.

After a gaggle of boy cousins, I was the last girl born into our family until we, my brother and our cousins, started having children. By the prescriptive Italian naming customs of our parents’ era, my older girl cousin should have been named Clementina. She wasn't.

So when my mother was pregnant with me, my father said simply, "If it's a girl, we'll name her after my mother." My mother, who had wanted to name me Jessica, thought she was consenting to Mindy. In their broken English, replete with Neapolitan dialect, Mindy had become my grandparents’ shorthand for Clementina (pronounced Clemindine). My mom heard a soft, cute, American nickname that predated the popular sitcom, Mork & Mindy. My dad meant something else entirely.

So when he arrived at the hospital after I was born and said, “So, Clementina, it is!” My mother looked at him, too exhausted to fight, and said, "What?" Here — you sign the papers. I won't do that to our daughter.”

He signed.

At least, that’s the family legend. And, how they justified calling me by a nickname I didn’t like. In movies, girls who shared my nickname were promiscuous or stupid. They ended up trapped. It was no small thing, the diminutive, but part of a larger picture of feeling like something was off, and I was living outside myself, occupying a life created by miscommunication, hostility, and capitulation.

In college, I tried to reclaim my real name. Did the kid sitting next to me want to borrow a pen? Was he too afraid he’d get my name wrong? Was he actually sweating it? I’d often cave, and by the end of sophomore year, I ended up with three variations on my name and answered to them all, albeit half-heartedly. I was still negotiating.

Then, during junior year, I spent a year abroad in Italy — and didn't want to come home. My Italian Amore, a 29-year-old from the countryside, had an amazing voice. In his Florentine dialect, my name became music. “Clementina,” he said. “It fits.”

Worried I’d never come home, my family came to get me — and they brought my nonna. We visited my grandparents' hometown of Casa Marciano. On the way to her family's house at the bottom of a winding, hilly street lined with Clementine trees, I finally understood what my mother had not.

I turned to my Nonna. "These are what we’re  named for?"

The fragrance was intoxicating, and I breathed in the fresh, honey-green scent as if it were my first breath. 

She gave me the knowing look. As if she had always known — as if this revelation was mine alone to have, and she had simply been waiting for me to catch up. Grandmothers are patient like that.

Standing there, I finally understood why my father and my amore loved my name. Naming your daughter Clementina was like naming her Lily, Jasmine, or Rose. It wasn't ugly. It wasn't shameful. My mother’s feelings and opinions weren’t the truth about me. 

· · ·

When I thought about what to name my business, I wanted to honor the name I’d shared with my grandmother — and expand her legacy, while making room for others, with a modern twist. The word "collective" came from a brand strategist friend who suggested it almost offhandedly. It felt right. That was thirteen years ago, long before collectives were everywhere.

Now, after years as founder, working with people who have something to say — even, especially, when they are nervous to say it — I've noticed that almost every single one of them has a version of this story. A moment in their past when they were labeled a lie. When they were made to feel they didn't belong, or that something was “wrong” with them. It’s a common writer's wound. 

The work I do — part of the work we do together — is what happened to me on that street in Southern Italy. It is the moment of integration: the moment you realize you get to decide who you are, what people call you, and how your story ends. Sometimes you just need a little nudge. Through our work together, you’ll come to understand your transformative arc.

Now, everyone calls me Clementina, or Clem, which I love if they’re giving friend energy.

That knowing, that being who you are, is the whole point, but that’s another lesson for another day. 

Ci Vediamo. Stai bene.