dani, noun

or: something about my name

Originally written and performed for “Call Me By My Name” at charis books & more, march 25 2026.

On the first day of Advanced Acting class my sophomore year of high school, Mr. Cate called roll. He let us know, “If you go by something else, if your name is shorter, if you wanna be, I don’t know, ‘Hero’ or something…” We all giggled, because what a ridiculous notion, but it was also my first day in Advanced Acting class. Only upperclassmen were eligible for Advanced Acting, and I had been foaming at the mouth for twelve months to finally begin the rest of my life here in this high school drama class. As any true theatre kid knows, it is never too early to make a name for yourself.

“Danielle Herd.”

At this moment in my personal history, I was already commonly “Dani.” Without much of a formal announcement, I started signing my homework “Dani” in the fourth grade and never looked back. That combination of intense jealousy towards kids with nicknames alongside my discomfort over the sheer pretty girliness of the name Danielle… I knew in my heart I was a Danielle in YOU ARE IN TROUBLE FULL NAME only. Danielle Elise Herd. So delicate and French until you run faceforward into that sonic brickwall of HERD at the end. Herd spelled “H-E-R-D”, like a group of cows.

From the stage of Dacula High School, Mr. Cate read, “Danielle Herd.” And I said, “I kind of want to be Hero.” With my 15-year-old boldness and bravado, I said, “I kind of want to be Hero.” And so I was. Within the walls of the Dacula High School theatre department, I was Hero. When I was named one of the Best Actors at One Act that fall and the name “Dani Herd” was called, my classmates looked up and down our row in confusion only to go, “Oh, it’s Hero.”

You heard me. One of the Best Actors at One Act.

I am thinking a lot lately about my relationship to theatre. What delicious bread crumbs led me to the school auditorium in the first place? All I can think is that I have always, always, always wanted to pretend to be someone else and, importantly, be rewarded for it. It’s a relief; to shed my own skin for the duration of a play and let someone else inhabit my body. Even when I was at my most successful as a professional actor, the crash landing back into my own body was so harsh and violent each night. It didn’t matter that I was being cast in plays, that I was playing dream roles I never could have imagined; I was still me, and so I wasn’t happy. My current unkind voice says, “There, look back then, that’s when you were making it, that’s when you were living your dream.” And yeah, like, that’s true, but is it a dream when you’re only content to be alive within the slivers when you get to inhabit a fictional character? I wasn’t real, and that’s what felt good. I was a puppet, brought to life Thursdays through Sundays (plus the occasional Tuesday and Wednesday matinee) by Titania, by Lady Macbeth, by Katherine the shrew, by Rosalind.

Fuck, I loved being Rosalind. Not playing, being, because I abhorred distance, I detested boundaries. For my two runs as Rosalind in As You Like It, I scrubbed the name “Dani” out of my brain. I was Rosalind, and then I was Ganymede, and then I was Rosalind again, though to tell you the trans truth of it all, I think maybe he’s still Ganymede in the safety of the forest of Arden. Why would I have wanted to be Dani again when I spent my evenings with my newly shorn hair, wearing a doublet and reading poetry and being adored by sweet, handsome Orlando? I remember the first month of being Rosalind onstage, going home to lie in bed beside my then-partner, early awareness thrumming through my body that I was not who I thought I was. Rosalind was whispering to me, clutching my hand and pulling me deeper into the forest of Arden where I was a boy, loved and free.

(Okay, freeze, fourth wall break, direct to camera: I don’t think I’m good at this anymore. And post-acting, THIS is what my name means, right? “Dani Herd,” noun, one who gets up on stages and spills their nonfiction guts. Lately, I feel so foggy and afraid and stagnant, and the water in my imagination is so murky and I am terrified to stick my hand in there. I’m not sure I want to find out anything else! Take your fear; name it. Failure. Always, always, always. I’m not good enough. On whichever side of myself, down whichever path, maybe I can’t outrun the certainty of my failure. It rings so heavy in my ears. Who am I if I lose this too? What will my name be?)

I still want to be Hero. I want to be Rosalind and Ganymede. I want to be loved and free and brave, and instead I am afraid and so mean to myself. And so boring about it, you know? I listen to 97.1 The River when I’m driving in my car, and I’m so fucking tired of hearing “Don’t Stand So Close to Me” by the Police. My internal “Don’t Stand So Close to Me” is “You’re bad, you’re ugly, you’re a disappointment, you ruined everything,” over and over on repeat. I fucking get it, play “Roxanne” for once.

What if Dani isn’t a noun anymore but a verb? “Dani Herd” is not a recognizable person, place, or thing, but instead I wake up every morning and bitch myself out for not immediately and constantly Dani-ing: for writing, for moving forward, for having a great idea, for making something good, for not needing help or rest. To “Dani” is not any of the other things I have discovered which make me feel any other feeling, and this is how I turn my own definition into a footnote. I am a sliver of myself, because I do not allow myself anything beyond my own first self-inflicted dictionary meaning.

Of myself forever reproaching myself, (for who more foolish than I and who more faithless?) A Walt Whitman quote for your Bingo card.

Sometimes I consider entirely new names that fill me with more boyish sunshine and vigor, but I don’t want to carry over my Dani baggage into them. But I suppose you always do, right? In transition, when do you fully shed the old skin and leave it behind? Even if you did, would you know it or would you forever pick at some phantom dead skin beneath your fingernails? Last night my therapist described my neverending journey to understand myself as “beautiful and relentless.” “Dani Herd,” adjective: beautiful and relentless.

It is not the forest of Arden, but this Saturday I am taking myself on a motherfucking nature walk. This is barely related to anything, but I need some accountability. We’re all friends now, please text me about this. I’m going on a NATURE WALK. I’m packing a PICNIC, and I’m not going to have a name at all. It’s all lopsided in my mind now; do I create the meaning of my own name or does my name tell me who I already am? Probably neither, but I am so desperate for meaning that I just want to be nothing for a minute. My desperation is eating me from the inside, so I’m going to put a sandwich in my gay little backpack and get bitten up by bugs and trace my fingers back and forth in the dirt. It worked for Rosalind!

I do not want my name to become synonymous with fear and self-cruelty and abandonment. That’s not what I want to mean to myself. I am not even only my dreams, not even when I achieve them! I am going to go to the nature trail, as this room full of queers is my witness, and I am going to breathe into the possibility of myself in the abstract. I am going to allow myself to become fascinated with my shapes and colors and concepts, and I hope you do too.

Whatever you already mean to yourself, let it out a little in the back, take in a deeper breath.