what’s in a name?

“…that which we call a rose / by any other word would smell as sweet…” ~Romeo and Juliet, 2.2.43-44

…is this a play on the fact that the Hebrew name Shoshana once meant “lily” and now means “rose”? you betcha.

(cw: grief, complicated family dynamics)

I feel like I write one of these every few years at this point—a post in which I wax poetic about how many names I have and why I have so many and what they all mean and what I would like to be called, et cetera, et cetera, ad nauseam. so I figured, for once, I’m going to write that post not on Facebook and I’m going to archive it somewhere where I can just have a handy link for future reference. 🙂

why do I keep having to do this, you might ask?

the truth is that I was doomed from birth—I had been destined to be the third of my name, named after my grandfather (who had no sons) and his father before him, but then I was assigned female at birth and my mom had to get really creative really quickly and ended up saddling me with a host of names that have started many an interesting story.

buckle up and let’s go on a journey, shall we?