The Meronym Sims Family [Me]

Last night we were playing The Sims, and created characters similar to each alter. Boss was enthralled (and so were we), and suggested I should put a copy here for everyone - and isn't it cool? From the left, Cherish in front, Gracelyn behind her, Kiara in front, Me in back, Paul in front, Sam in back, and Rubi on the right. Of course, there's no Silent One; I'm not sure how I would create that.

Boss said that they were all really obvious to him, both from his knowledge of them, and the pics in the albums on Pinterest for each alter. Except for Cherish. He didn't see her quite like that, and had trouble placing her. He never did answer how he does see her, though.

And of course, the characters aren't exactly a match for how everyone looks in my head, but it's close. For instance, the ages - you have five choices - infant, child, teen, adult, and elder. I put Kiara and Paul as children, but they aren't really the same age. Kiara should be a little younger than shown, and Paul should be a little older. I put Cherish and Rubi as teens. Rubi is 17, but Cherish is 19. And I wanted to put Gracelyn as an elder, but that only comes up with quite older characters, and no choice but grey hair.

And the clothes weren't exactly what any of us would pick, either, given unlimited choices. But they at least got the spirit of each alter correct, so we're pleased. It was neat to see each person go co-conscious to help pick their own looks and clothes and stuff.

I played the family in-game for a couple of days' game time. And it's really hectic and busy and hard to keep up with. On his own blog, Boss wrote, "But seeing them wonder[sic] around in sims reminds me of how chaotic it is in their head sometimes with everyone milling around."

Call Us Meronym [Me]

I've recently added one more name to the list of those I'll answer to: Meronym. But this is not a new alter, or a name taken by an alter. Instead, it's a gestalt name, one that applies to the entire system as a whole.

A meronym is a grammatical term meaning 'a part of something used to refer to the whole'. The most frequent example is using faces to mean people, as in "I've seen a lot of faces over the years," but meaning that you've met a lot of people. (By the way, a gestalt is "a structure, configuration, or pattern or physical, biological, or psychological phenomena so integrated as to constitute a functional unit with properties not derivable by summation of its parts.)

So, although there are eight personalities inside my head, we share one common body, and a large part of our memory and functions. We have a structure; a gestalt. And we've chosen to take on the name Meronym to refer to the entire structure as opposed to any one of us. Technically, any one of us is a meronym for the system, so we are a collection of meronyms forming a gestalt. But Meronym, as a name, will suffice.

So how do you know whether to use the name Meronym or not? I have an example (don't I always?). Let's say there's a family of people named Smith - Joe, Jane, John, Jim, and Jerry. If you pick up the phone, and recognize the person on the line, you might say "Hi Jim". If a male answers and you're not sure which of them it is, you might say, "Hello, Mr. Smith." But if you're referring to the family as a whole, not its individual members, you would just say "The Smiths." So - to apply that to us... If you know which alter you're dealing with, use their name - "Hi Sam", "Hi Kiara", etc. If you're not sure who you're dealing with, you're probably safer in just using my name - "Hello, M-." But if you want to refer to the gestalt, the entire structure, not a single personality, use Meronym -"This is a gift for Meronym."

I hope that helps any confusion. And you know, if it doesn't, well just use whatever works easiest for you. We're accustomed to making do and taking whatever effort is needed to get along with the singletons world out there.