My sister's name is
Patricia nn
Patty. We had a great-aunt who always spelled her name Paddie. And when my sister and I were in England together, a guy gave me a hard time about how I said her name, because I said it "
Paddy" instead of hard-pronouncing the Ts in the middle. Shut up, jerk, I'm American.
I see the appeal that
Patricia once had for so many. It's soft and long and looks and sounds elegant. Unlike you, I like
Patricia a lot more than I like
Martha. But I've never been able to warm to the nickname
Patty.
My sister tried, when she was in the third grade, to change her nickname to
Trish, but it didn't stick. It started on the first day of school when the teacher saw her name was
Patricia and asked, "What are you called?
Trish?" My sister decided to go with it and said, "Yes." She thinks that was stupid now.