Well it triggered my inner dev and spend some testing.
Guess you can, but it's not very efficient... And the only way I managed to use a column property in a macro was after displaying it.
for example when using cms.User object I could uppercase the username, but only when displaying it
{%UserName%} {%UserName.ToUpper()%}
So not sure where your reference is coming from (custom table, specific page, or custom class)
But as a POC:
I'm getting UserName based on UserID through a Macro using a where on the Users from GlobalObjects
ID: {%UserID%} - Name: {%GlobalObjects.Users.Where("UserID = '"+UserID+"'").FirstItem.Username#%}
Make sure to click Advanced in the "editing control settings" section
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and it works ^_^
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another tip if you want to test out macros is using the Console or Benchmark module you can find at
System > Macros > Bechmark