Kia Thrower

What does my actual name mean? I don’t know. You’d have to ask Shirley and Michael. The story is that I’m named after my dad, Michael, a.k.a. Mike. His name comes from the bible. It is Hebrew for “who is like God”. So I guess since my name is a variation of his that I am “like God” too? Originally, it was supposed to be Mikea, pronounced my-KEE-uh. But my mom said she didn’t like the spelling because it wasn’t pretty enough (for a beautiful baby like myself). So she changed the spelling to Mykia. You would think that it was simple, just MYKIA. But some people just can’t seem to get it right. I don’t understand though. Its just MY and KIA. Like a compound word. But people still seem to mess it up. Makiyah, Mickya, Mikeyah, I hear it all. MY and KIA. But I guess it’s because people assume that because I’m black and because my name is not in the baby name book that it is ‘made up’ and has a lot of extra syllables and sounds. That makes me laugh. When I started freshman year, I started introducing myself to people as just Kia, a nickname given to me by friends. Not because I didn’t like Mykia, just because it was easier on the first couple days of school to tell teachers they could just call me Kia, since people were calling me that anyway. I like it. It’s not hard. People don’t mess it up. And when people say “like the car?” I just smile and say yes. Kia. It’s more me. It’s all mine and all about me. And I do love that I was named after my dad because it’s honorable and it makes for a pretty good story at social events, but Kia is all me. It has its own backgrounds. Kia comes from African origin meaning hill. It is so me. I have my ups and downs. When you are on a journey, I can be your best friend or your worst enemy. Getting to know me can be like climbing a hill, but if you don’t turn around, you’ll get to the top and it will be ok from there. Hill. Kia. Mykia. Who is like God.