What's in a name? Not much

SHARON MELNICER SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH BULLETIN

Poppy-clad war veterans in navy-blue blazers loiter in the chilly doorways of malls. Shoppers rushing by are urged to throw some change into the white, cardboard boxes dangling from bent, proud necks. The red, felt flower is pinned onto coats and jackets to remind us that November is the month of Remembrance. But for me, it's also a time of personal memory, clouded with puzzle and error.

My father was a true Armistice baby, actually born on Nov. 11, 1918. His birthday was marked by global celebration. It was a day of peace and jubilation throughout the entire world, the banner day that brought the horrifying and bloody First World War, the purported "war to end all wars," to a long-awaited conclusion.

My father came from Jewish, Russian, immigrant parents, who had been safely dwelling in Canada themselves for only eight years at the time of his arrival into the world. In 1910, they had barely managed to flee the massacres and the terrifying pogroms, murderously directed toward the Jews by anti-Semitic czars and their cruel henchmen, the Cossacks, in what was fast becoming Communist Russia. By 1917, my grandparents were solidly established in Winnipeg, the hardworking parents of two Canadian-born children thus far, thousands of miles away from the chaotic, blood-soaked inferno called the Russian Revolution.

My father came into the world one year later. My grandmother gave birth to him in a small, drafty, poorly constructed, clapboard house on Boyd Avenue, in Winnipeg's teeming North End, on the cold, wintry Armistice Day of Nov. 11, 1918.

His birth was registered several days later when my busy grandfather could at last find a few minutes to run down to city hall. The official birth certificate was issued several weeks later; it noted that my father's birthday was Nov. 7, 1918. That was not the only mistake. My grandparents chose the name Itzhak for their new son, however, it also did not appear on the birth certificate correctly. Instead, in the space beside "Given Name," the clerk recorded "Izzy," a non-descript moniker my dad detested all his life, and one which he continually tried to change.

There was no explanation for these errors other than a probable miscommunication between the impatient, English-speaking registery clerk and my harried, Yiddish-speaking grandfather. Since my father's birth took place at home, with the help of a local midwife, a commonplace event at the time, it was not unusual for official birthdates, or even names, to be different from the actual ones.The outcome was that my dad had two birthdays and two names as he grew up, and it was hit-or-miss which one was celebrated or what name was put on the birthday card.

At the age of 23, my father joined the Canadian army, becoming a lance-corporal in the medical corps. The conscription of soldiers hadn't begun yet. My father wanted to volunteer before he was called. The Second World War swiftly ground its way through 1940, then 1941. In early 1942, the draft was declared when it was apparent that the "short, quickly won war against the barbaric Huns" was not going to be as brief or as easily won as the politicians thought. My father survived miraculously. He first laid eyes on me in June 1945 when he returned home to his young wife of four years and his baby daughter, who was then six months old.

His discharge papers were another version of the "double-trouble" birth certificate. It had him born on Nov. 7, 1918, and his official name was stated as "Israel." More letters were sent to vital statistics, more forms were filled in, more money orders enclosed. A new birth certificate was finally issued. This time the birthdate was correct but my father's name was now "Itzy." A tired shrug of the shoulders was my father's final, frustrated response to the bureaucratic mix-up. Like Tina Turner's song, "Private Dancer," he would be whoever they wanted him to be.

The intervening years have gone by with stunning speed and, sadly, my father is dead now. We no longer have to guess what date we'll choose to mark his birthday because there are no more birthdays left to celebrate. But my mother and I have ensured that the name and the dates are inscribed correctly on his gravestone, just as they should be. As he'd want them to be. He was in all things a meticulous man.

A package arrived from Veterans Affairs Canada about a year ago. It was addressed to my mother. Inside lay a carefully sealed envelope which contained two things: a letter of thanks to my father, Lance-Corporal I. Guslits, and the War Medal 1939-1945, an impressive disc of engraved silver suspended from a gaily striped ribbon of red, white and blue. The letter tells us that the medal has been "awarded for service anytime between the years 1939-1945, to full-time personnel of the armed forces wherever their service has been rendered." Thankfully, there are no puzzles or errors to sort out here. The name is correct, the dates of service accurate and, most of all, his bravery and courage are clearly acknowledged and remembered.

The medal hangs in a simple, wooden frame on my wall and on Remembrance Day, I can't help but look at it with some heaviness but with a great deal of pride, as well. Nearby, on the same wall, is an old, cracked, sepia photo of my father, on one of his two second birthdays. On the back, "Itzhak" is scrawled in Yiddish, still and forever, untranslated by an officious civil servant at a registry office to some other, more pronounceable name.

We, who remember my father, know what we need to know every Nov. 11. He was born on the day the First World War officially ended, Armistice Day; he joined the army to fight for peace and freedom in the world when his country needed him in the Second World War. I only wish he had lived to see the medal that was awarded him posthumously for remembrance. He would have enjoyed seeing that the government finally got its facts straight.

Sharon Melnicer is a Jewish writer, artist and teacher living in Winnipeg.

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