First, let me extend thanks on behalf of the family and myself to everyone for coming from near and far, to the rabbi for all his help, and to Rachel for all she’s done to make it happen. We also remember those who couldn’t be with us today, aunts, uncles, cousins, and friends, and those who are no longer here, in particular our aunt Hazel, whom we miss very much.

How the Cheetah Got his Spots

You are a boy with an unusual number of names. In the interest of embarrassing you a little, I’d like to talk about this situation for a very few minutes.

When you were born, we knew that you would be named Samuel Joseph,

[soy lawmv, after my uncle Sam Joffe, rdnskla /b lawmv,

my grandfather Joseph Shulman [laow baz /b whyla [soy,

and my other uncle, Joseph Harry Joffe rdnskla /b [soy /orha.

You didn’t know any of them; Sam died in 1976, Saba Joe as he was called, in 1965, and Harry in 1943 ____________.

The problem was what to call you. Samuel Joseph is a mouthful, as you probably have become aware. After a while of calling you ‘the baby’ and other generic names, I arrived somehow at Boo Boo, one of those ridiculous pet names that parents love and kids hate. Then when you were six months old we took you to the excavation at Megiddo where a very famous Israeli archaeologist pointed out that if you were Boo Boo, that would make me Abu Boo Boo, which wouldn’t do at all. It was another Israeli archaeologist who suggested Shai, taking v and y from both your names, and reminding us that the great writer Agnon had been called Shai.

And so, to me and to some others like your Saba and Safta, you are Shai. To your mother and sister, you are Sam, although when she was very young, your sister called you Ham, but we won’t count that. To Bubba and Zayda you are Samuel. And so on.

The point here is that the names we gave you were your mother’s and my way of honoring the past and people you didn’t know, and to give you some kind of place for the future. And when we looked at you, we knew immediately that the names were correct, even if they were a mouthful. But you have different names for different occasions and always will. Here in shul you’ll always be

<yyj rdnskla /b [soy lawmv, which links you to me, just as I am

dwd /nj /b <yyj rdnskla, which links me to Saba, who is

rdnskla /b dwd /nj . This is a way for us to remember people who are no longer here beside us but who are still a part of us.

We’re connected to the past, but take it from me, that’s a blessing and a curse. In our house the past is all around us; we can barely walk around thanks to the millions of books on archaeology and Jewish history and a hundred other subjects. You’ve grown up hearing names like Frederick Bliss and Elie Kedourie at all hours, and recently a group of British generals have taken over a couple of rooms, led by Sir Alexander Galloway.

This isn’t easy for a kid, basically having all these people – in addition to your parents - telling you what’s important, what’s good, what’s right. But you’re strong enough not to let any of it crush you and smart enough to learn from it all, to use it all to make yourself. Its the same way that you’re smart enough to find the things that you like, like baseball, and things that you’re good at, like 47^th grade math, and make them part of you. Putting it all together is the trick. But as the late President Kennedy said when he announced the plan to put a man on the moon, we do these things not because they are easy, but because they are hard.

Knowing who you are, at least in one place, having one name,

<yyj rdnskla /b [soy lawmv, as a pivot around which all your other selves revolve, I hope will help. Everything is a choice today and we know that you’ll make the right ones. Don’t worry though, we’ll bug you about it all.

We love you boy, and we’re proud of you.