My Older Daughter (Redux)

This blog is about my older daughter.

She was born on October 2, 1989, at Beth Israel Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts.

Her name at birth was Bracha Tikva Rosenwasser.

Bracha is a Hebrew word meaning "blessing." It was also my grandmother's name.

Tikva is a Hebrew word meaning "hope." It is part of the Israeli national anthem, "Hatikvah," which means "The Hope."

So my daughter's name can be taken to mean "Blessing of Hope."

My legal name (all stage names and online monikers notwithstanding) is Heshy Rosenwasser.

Bracha's last name, appearing on her birth certificate, is my last name.

In 1994, at the time she was being registered for school, her mother registered her under her stepfather's last name. Thus my daughter became known by that name, even though her stepfather never legally adopted her and her last name still remained the same as mine on all her documentation.

She called herself by her stepfather's last name throughout her childhood and adolescence. That's how she became known to friends and family, and in school.

When she got married, she took the opportunity to change her legal name so that it included her stepfather's last name and her husband's last name.

This, of course, is her prerogative, and legal right as an adult.

However, the name on her birth certificate remains as it was: Bracha Tikva Rosenwasser.

Neither she, nor her mother, nor her stepfather, nor her husband can change the facts of her birth, any more than they can change her DNA.

She is, and will always remain, my daughter.

And I will always love her.

Bracha hugging me after hearing the song I wrote for her performed live for the first time, December 2011.

I post this here now, on her birthday, because some people see this history as inconvenient and contrary to an altered new narrative thereof. I am putting these people on notice that I neither buy nor accept this supposed narrative. They cannot rewrite history and I will not be party to such attempts, no matter what they say they "require" of me, or any threat implicit therein. This blog and photo will remain where they are, and anyone who has a problem with it will just have to deal.

Because the truth must be spoken somewhere. That is all.