I’m probably the only Jew ever named Alexander Frederick Remington.
I’m the product of an interfaith marriage, which means that I struggle with questions of ambiguous identity – like, well, all Jews – but don’t have a last name to remind me of, and announce to the rest of the world, my inherent Jewishness.
A last name is like a secret handshake: it’s how to identify a landsman, a fellow-traveler, someone who will laugh loudly and whose mother will feed one if one is ever truly desperate. A last name is an identifying mark.
Families who had their name changed at Ellis Island or who changed it themselves to escape persecution still preserve the memory of the old name, wearing the new one like a surplus skullcap in the box by the entrance, put on when appropriate and doffed when appropriate, not an essential part of their being.
But my name is my own. It has never changed. I am proud to be a Remington, a male member of a family that has been in this country hundreds of years, producing paintings, bullets, razors, typewriters, and even chains of hotels and technical colleges. I love the family who share my name, who carried it before me and who gave it to me. But my name doesn’t identify me by the food I eat, the jokes I like, the place I want to be on Friday night, the God I worship. It doesn’t identify me by the mother through whom, according to Jewish law, my heritage flows. It’s mine, but curiously incomplete, as though it would feel more apt if it were Remingtonberg or Remingtonstein.
So the other parts of me compensate. My accent, all on its own, pinches with a hint of Noo Yawk, my nose and tongue ache for garlic and onions. On occasional Fridays, I go to shul and sit in the back, wearing a yarmulke from the box by the door. I follow along with the tunes and sheepishly check to make sure I’m on the right page. I don’t know the language, but at least I know I’m where I belong.
Alex Remington is an editorial aide for The Washington Post. He also co-moderates E.J.'s Precinct.
