The Healing Journey

February 3, 2025

“What’s in a name?”
— Juliet

When someone we love dies, our lives change in big ways and in little ways. Sometimes forever. Ann, whose husband Paul died after 70 years together, said, “When you lose somebody you love, your life is not the same. I just never never thought that he would never be here.” 

One of the small ways that her life changed was she could never send out another greeting card … even though she had been known for birthday cards, Christmas cards, sympathy cards and all kinds of cards. 

The reason was simple. She couldn’t think of writing her name without his beside hers. It hurt too much. 

What’s in a name? Shakespeare said nothing really. In a famous speech in Act II of “Romeo and Juliet,” she says, “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose, by any other word would smell as sweet.”

She was referring to her beloved’s family name “Montague,” and she believed the differences between their families, which keep them apart, was only because they had different names. The truth, however, is that everything is in a name.

Carol and Bob always included the name of their late son Rob, who died when he was still a child, with theirs when they signed their cards, just so people wouldn’t forget they were the parents of a son even though he had passed. They weren’t complete without him, and it is his name that is beside theirs on their gravestone.

©Joseph Pisani

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