I have been known to half jokingly, half seriously say that I died the day I was born. People would look at me and invariably ask: “What do you mean by that?” To which I would respond with the story of how when I was living in Las Vegas and I had just turned 17 and went looking for my first job. Back in the day, it wasn’t an automatic thing to issue a social security number at the time of birth, so I had to have one officially issued, therefore I required my birth certificate in order to complete this transaction.

So, I went through the rigmarole of getting my birth certificate from the Texas Department of Vital Statistics, and since I was living in Nevada at the time and the year was 1979 (I know, I’m an Oldie, but a Goodie!), this means that the only means of acquiring this document is through what is currently “euphemistically” known as “snail-mail,” or another way of putting it would be by “Pony Express!” Basically, it takes forever, in this case it was about 30 days!

So, I receive my birth certificate and I begin to immediately peruse it, the very first thing with which I was struck was that the document was blue, an interesting shade of blue at that, not baby or sky blue, a bit darker than that, a pretty deep blue, now that I really think about it. I then looked at the section where it showed my “vital statistics” such as eye color and such, and I again was struck by the fact that both my eyes and my hair color were listed as “Black,” not Dark Brown or just Brown, but Black, that has always stayed with me, to this very day!

Everything else on the certificate was pretty standard, name of mother, of father, doctor’s signature and for some reason, my grandma’s name and signature was also on this certificate, never really thought much about that , , , hm! However, the realization that I came to during my perusal of this document was the following: Along the left side of the certificate, I noticed that there was additional writing, which I could read in it’s upright position and when I noticed that there was a row of exes crossing something out, I turned the paper sideways so that I can see it clearer and my mind, I don’t know, it went somewhere, though I can’t really describe where, I was just gone, for I don’t know how long and then I finally focused on the words again, I could plainly see the word Certificate and the word preceding it, that word being the one that had been exed out, and that word was DEATH and right above it was typed the word BIRTH! So, it went from a Death Certificate to a Birth Certificate by a few strokes of the EX key, hm . . .

At the time, I just figured that they had run out of the actual birth certificate form and since the death certificate contains the same information, some intrepid soul said, I’ll just EX out death and type in birth, no big deal, it’s still official, with the seal and everything, right?! After getting over the initial shock that my birth certificate was actually a death certificate, the jokes began, I died the day I was born, think about it! By this time in life, I had become privy to some information of which any of us (my siblings and I) had been unaware, not that it was a big secret or anything, it’s just something about our family that we didn’t grow up knowing, in fact I found out about it when I was about 13 or 14, so I had known for a while by this time!

To set this up for you I should let you know that my Dad was known for his story-telling, in fact, after the movie Big Fish came out, we began calling my Dad Big Fish because of his tall tales – or were they? We did find out after he died that at least one of his tall tales did actually take place, and the reason we know this is because, since he was in the Army at the time, the incident caused him to receive a Court Martial and so the entire case was laid out for us to see. Of course, the official telling is slightly different from my Dad’s version, but all the elements are there, so we know he was telling the truth, even if he did “stretch” it a bit, lol! So anyway, my dad would tell us stories of growing up in Puerto Rico, lugging water from the river at 4 years old and other such tales of life on the island, especially living with my apparently entrepreneurial great grandmother Mercedes. He would speak of his childhood often, living in Puerto Rico and then later on, when he moved to New York City, Manhattan as a matter of fact, when he was about 9 years old!

One day he decides to talk about his mom, my grandmother Felicita, from what I understand this was a hard woman, very tough, very devout Catholic who later in life converted to Baptist. She was a seamstress and was apparently very hardworking and also constantly uprooting my dad and his older sister to move closer to a job that paid better than the previous one. My aunt Maria, my name sake, eventually got married away to an older guy and she eventually went on to have 5 children. My dad on the other hand was still at home and to hear him tell it, it was like living in a prison! My grandmother was distrustful of his activities whenever he was away from the house and not at school and from the stories he used to tell, I can’t say I blame my grandma very much for feeling this way, like a warden, I mean, lol!

He would speak of her as being this no nonsense, very serious individual who by one telling, broke up with one of her many “MENses” because he decided in a rare moment to swing from a bar that was suspended in the doorway, I think it may have been a permanent curtain rod, so it was pretty solidly in the wall and this guy just swung on it, much like a monkey I guess you would say, and my grandma was like, Oh hell to the NO, you are a grown ass man, you will not be around here displaying this kind of foolish behavior in front of my impressionable teen aged son, no sirree, get out! So she threw him out, pretty harsh, huh? It what at this time in my life when I realized that the assumptions we make about any situation, very often turn out to be incorrect! I mean for all I knew, my grandma had a husband and she had her children and that’s how things happened, that’s how they worked! Huh, what did I know, right?! LOl!

But no, instead I find out that my grandma never did marry any of the men with whom she involved herself, including my dad’s dad, in fact, I found out that she actually asked him to leave while she was pregnant with my dad, so my dad never got to know his dad, though he did say he got to see him and he knew who he was; by this time he was married and had other children and my dad made a choice “not” to make contact and that was his decision. So what happened was since his actual dad wasn’t around, my grandma asked a family friend to give my dad his name, and he agreed so my dad went from Muniz which is my grandma’s maiden name to Lopez, the name of the family friend. So I found out in that moment that my name is not Lopez that it is actually Carrasquillo, imagine my surprise! But wait, because it doesn’t end there!

Let’s rewind, even further back in time to when I was six years old, just starting kindergarten in Alaska and I’m in class, I’m not exactly sure how it came to be, but I suddenly realized that the teacher was calling me Maria and I didn’t know why she was doing that, because as far as I knew I was Julieta or Julietita or just Tita for short, who was this Maria person?! Now you have to understand, I was a very precocious child while I was growing up, I didn’t think like other children, my thought processes were waaay different from those around me and so naturally, I asked my parents why the teacher was calling me Maria. The answer, was interesting I found out, because as it turns out, My birth certificate has my name as Maria Julieta Velazquez Lopez, however, in the Hispanic culture whenever the name Maria preceded another name, it was only in deference to the Virgin Mary (it’s a Catholic thing apparently like Nuns calling themselves Sister Mary Roberts or Sister Mary Elise or whatever)!

So, it turns out that in America, no such deference occurs so whichever name shows up first on your birth certificate, that is your name from now on, once you enter the school system. Please keep in mind that I am an American, I was born here in the United States but my parents were of Puerto Rican (my dad) and of Mexican (my mom) descent and my mom was Catholic so she named me after herself Julieta and in deference to the Virgin Mary, she named me Maria Julieta and was known as Julietita (little Juliet) or just Tita for short. Interestingly enough my Cousin Lupita had the same problem. In fact, she and I are only 6 months apart (I’m the eldest) and so we were known as “twins” because her name was Guadalupe or Lupita or Pita for short, so we were Tita and Pita, las gemelas (the twins)! Her birth certificate stated that her name was Maria Guadalupe, so there you go, she became Maria as well and for her, coming from Mexico, she was significantly older than I had been when that name was forced upon me, I can only imagine how it was for her, today she just calls herself Mara, but I still call her Lupita and she still calls me Tita, lol!

So, as you can see, the fact that my actual name is now coming into question, the joke about dying the day I was born, doesn’t seem so funny anymore, but wait, there’s more! Shortly before my Mom passed away in February of 2007, she announced to us sort of matter of factly, that her dad, my grandpa Angel Velazquez had been adopted, therefore his name was not Velazquez, that was his adopted name, his real name was Ruelas, what?! Wait, so let’s summarize for the moment, I’m not Julieta I’m Maria, I’m not Lopez I’m Carrasquillo and now I’m not Velazquez I’m Ruelas! Therefore, in a sense, I do not exist! The only name that I can be assured of actually having is Julieta or Tita for short, little Juliet, but that could have been any name, I’m realizing now! Add to the fact, that for some reason unbeknownst to me, whenever my girls would ask me what my name was, my response was always: “I AM She Who Shall Remain Nameless!” I was surprised actually, the first time that expression came into my head, but I never really gave it much thought, until recently that is, when I started to piece things together from my past and certain experiences that I have had, and of trying to make sense out of why I was so different and still am to this day!

So, what I have discovered, well not discovered exactly, but have begun to seriously consider that perhaps I did indeed Die the day I was Born, literally died, as in a Near Death Experience (or NDE) as a baby, I was pronounced dead, but somehow came back unexpectedly and maybe that is why my certificate is one of Death, because all of the information had already been filled out and since there was no change in the actual information, the word Death was simply exed out and the word Birth was typed in it’s place, and voila, still official!! You know, I can’t know for sure if this is what has happened, however in light of many “woo woo” experiences that I have had throughout my almost 59 years of being alive I question if this may have been the case. Add to the fact, that I do watch a lot of programs and read books about near death experiences and sometimes when someone is relating their particular story, I find myself resonating with what they have experienced, particularly to how they felt once they came back from the experience and having to deal with “ordinary” life afterwards, but for me it’s weird, because I don’t have an actual memory of dying and then coming back, unless it happened when I was a baby; and that would explain my feelings of “other-worldliness” which I haven’t been able to shake even to this day!!!!

So there’s my story, still trying to make sense of it, I’m not sure how to proceed to find out if this is indeed what happened to me, I am uncertain what to do next, I feel that I really need to know, because it would sure explain a lot of things, let me tell you!!!! However, I am an orphan, and pretty much anyone who would have had any information regarding my birth is no longer with us, so I’m at an impasse . . . any suggestions, they would be greatly appreciated?! In the interim, thanks for reading, and please continue to Be Blessed! Carry On, Carry On!