In a lot of ways, life for men and women has become equalized, but married women still face a unique problem that men don’t, namely, what to call themselves.  The overabundance of courtesy titles for women—Miss, Ms., Mrs.—really is pretty ridiculous.  My own choice is Ms., and I don’t answer to anything else.  But other women are just as adamant about being called Mrs., and in all likelihood there’s someone out there who passionately identifies herself as a Miss.  What’s a poor guy to do before addressing a woman he doesn’t know?  Throw a dart?  Pick one at random and hope for the best?  Call a Ms. a Mrs. and he’ll be labeled a chauvinist.  Call a Mrs. a Ms. and he’ll insult her.  Call a Mrs. a Miss and presumably he’ll insult her even more.  The only way out of this mess is for every woman to become a doctor until the whole thing blows over.

My own feelings on the subject began with a case of ms.taken identity.  One day at work, many years ago, I received a letter from the head office of a Japanese company addressed to me correctly in every respect except that my name was preceded by “Mr.”  Now, it’s not like I have one of those ambiguous first names like “Pat,” but still I figured, “They’re Japanese—how would they know?”  So I answered the letter and added a polite, amiable request that I be addressed as “Ms.” in the future.  The next letter I received from the same person in the same office at the same company addressed me as…Mr.  It was as much a slap in the face as if some bizarre and arbitrary social custom had compelled the letter-writer to address me as “Bob” regardless of my actual name.  I must admit there was also an element of vanity to it: while calling a Mrs. a Miss may get you in hot water, calling a Ms. a Mr. will make the pot boil over.

My use of the title Ms. to the exclusion of all others has come in handy in ways I never could have imagined years ago when I started using it.  For instance, who could have guessed that in the year 2004 no one would actually answer a home phone any more for fear of being accosted by a telemarketer?  Occasionally, though, out of longtime habit, I still pick up when my phone rings.  If a telemarketer starts off with “Mrs. Snodwipe*?  I’m calling to tell you about an exciting offer from EatMyShortsCorp …" the first thing I say is,  “It’s not Mrs.”  That usually throws salespeople off balance and elicits profuse apologies.  Once their rhythm is broken, few telemarketers can get it back, and the conversation just kind of deflates like a leaking balloon until it finally disintegrates into nothing.

One day, it got even better.  After I interrupted a salesman to say, “It’s not Mrs.” he said, “Oh, I’m sorry—I just assumed you were married.”  Of course, I followed up with the clarification, “Oh, I’m married.  I’m just not a Mrs.”  There was a pause while he processed this, the paradox of a married woman who’s not a Mrs. apparently too much to grasp.  A few moments later, the exchange concluded with the salesman saying huffily, “Well, I’ll call back when you know who you are!” Then he hung up on me!  I am so proud of that moment.

Over the years, I’ve developed other approaches for making known my opinion on this topic.  If a man insists on calling me “Mrs.” even after being corrected, I start addressing him as “Mistress,” which I explain calmly is my title for married men.  (It’s a phonic analogy: Miss/Mrs., Mr./Mistress).  It doesn’t matter whether he’s actually married or not, since only people who don’t know me call me Mrs., so they don’t know if I’m married, either—they just assume.  Calling a man “mistress” usually generates a strong reaction.  It’s not an accident that my choice of “mistress” carries with it all sorts of emasculating connotations.  Let me tell you, I get respect or I get left alone pretty quick after that, and both are okay by me.

I told my friend M— (the one of “all men are a**holes and all women have sh*t for brains” fame—see TMF #3) about this, and he wrote back: “I thought a married man was known as ‘dead man walking.’  Too cumbersome?  Well, sticking to the Ms. and Mis- theme, how about Ms. and Misery, Ms. and Miscast, Ms. and Mischance, Ms. and Mischief, Ms. and Miscreant, Ms. and Misled or Ms. and Mistake?  I take it Ms. and Master is out of the question?”  He’s a real wit.

The whole Ms./Mrs./Miss thing is really a red herring, anyway.  Why do we even need two titles, much less the plethora of feminine ones we have now?  Why not one gender-neutral title that can be applied to everyone without any hard feelings?  I propose “Yo.”  The best argument for its adoption is that it’s already familiar to everyone, so no one can refuse it on the basis that they’ve got to learn some strange-sounding new word.  Try it out.  “Yo Jones, how are you doing?” “Yo Schneidelbaum, the doctor will see you now.”  It just feels natural to me.

An alternative proposal, but one I fear would meet with some resistance (you could say I have some ms.givings about it), is to just call everyone Mrs.  After all, the guys are already in there.  Look carefully: Mrs.  If that’s not enough inclusivity for you, we can even change the pronunciation to be more explicit.  I think it would come out something like…“Mister-ess.”  Hey, it looks like we’re back where we started!

But it would never work.  It would just get ms.pronounced, ms.read, ms.spelt, and it would lead to ms.understanding as guys complained about being made into ms.fits as a result of ms.labeling.  And to think this whole train of thought started with a missing Ms.

* Not my real name.