Sunday

Today, New Jersey feels like California, and it is Easter. Christ is risen. He is risen indeed.

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I had dinner with a very devout Christian friend earlier this week, and I asked her all of these questions that didn't need to be asked. She was very patient and tried to answer them. But I was just lodging complaints. What does it matter that none of us know our own names? I mean, our real names--not the words that our parents put on the birth certificate, which may mean something, but which most of the time mean nothing.

Being an immigrant, and having friends who are immigrants, I see people change their names all the time. The thing which most intimately denotes our existence and identity has almost nothing to do with who we are. It's a convention, something that others can pronounce, a certain style or flavor that we would like to be associated with when our names take shape in the minds of people who think of us, the referent. And most of the time, that style or flavor is just whoever else had that name earlier and the impression he made on the world, for better or for worse.

We're children of God, she said, that's all we need to know. I guess some questions will be answered in time.

Christ is risen. He is risen indeed.