Prompt – Favorite Name
What is in a name?
When I ventured out on a university tour my senior year of high school I found that my first and last name was not so unique. There were two other girls on campus that shared my name, Jessica Green, one even shared a middle name. And just last week I was notified by I.T. at work that I needed to type out my name because within the organization there was another Jessica Davis hired.
By the time the Adoption was over I was 5 and ½. My parents had thought about changing my name. My mother wanted to name me Jennifer (the only other name as popular as Jessica during my school years). My father took a different approach. He wanted to call me Jerrica. He said it was a kind mix of the names I came with (Jessica Renee). Yet they could not see changing my full name so they added a second middle name.
How I got my name was always just a story to me, a part of my bigger story of being adopted. It was not until we had children that I realized the importance of giving a child a name. It really is an awesome gift. My mother and father made the best of the situation and decided to add to my name. They appreciated the art of naming and researched names and meanings. They found the meanings behind the names I already had and wanted to find one that complemented them .
My parents had a few names they liked and also asked my opinion on a name. In the end I went from being Jessica Renee Totman to Jessica Renee Cortenay Green. And before anyone ask yes I know how to spell, that is the Female spelling of Cortenay . 🙂
Jessica means Wealthy, Renee means Born again and Cortenay means Gift of the Court which is only fitting as they had spent many hours / years waiting for the judge to sever rights and finalize the adoption.
A few years ago, my father told me to google my maiden name. I was unsure what I might find. I assumed I would find other Jessica Green’s but never really thought I would find anything specifically to me.
As it turns out what I found was amazing. Initially the first page that came up listed my name and a few other names. It was nice but nothing earth moving. As I worked backwards to find the home page I discovered my biological family tree. This page started me on my journey to discovering my biological name. The Tree that is traced is the Walker line, the paternal line of my biological mother.
As I have gotten older I have come to appreciate more what my name holds, it holds the key to my past and to my present.