What is in a name?

Soon after I moved to this area I was invited by a friend to join a breakfast group of Jewish seniors who met at The Kirkland Pancake House.

Among them was Danny Rich, a quite affable and verbose participant in all discussions.

In the course of things of things it was revealed that Danny was a Catholic of Italian descent'

The question was how did he get affiliated with that group.

Coming to America his family had Americanized their name from Ricci to Rich.

This caused dating problems in college where Italian Catholic girls avoided dating him assuming from his name that he was Jewish and not wanting to risk a serious relationship outside of their community.

Jewish girls would date him drawing back for the same reason when they found his backround.

This situation seemed to prevail with male friends so he moved mainly with Jewish groups.

He did find a nice Italian American Catholic girl to marry.

I write this as I just discovered that Danny, the outgoing guy, has passed away.