Annie -

But it can also be a cage. “You don’t look like an Annie,” people say, when you speak your mind too sharply. As if the name requires you to be quiet, cheerful, and agreeable.

It doesn’t try to be fancy. It doesn’t add a superfluous “-belle” or a complicated spelling. It is simply itself: four letters, two syllables, one soft vowel sandwich between two gentle consonants. But it can also be a cage

Whether you spell it Annie, Anne, or Ann—the soul of the name is the same. It is the friend who shows up with soup. It is the colleague who fixes the typo without taking credit. It is the little girl on the stage belting her heart out, and the grandmother knitting in the corner, keeping the family history in her stitches. It doesn’t try to be fancy