Conversation with God, Goddess, and Good Lord….it’s Not All About the Great I Am!
--
“You need to come up with another handle for being a news anchor if you want to get involved in that role.” God smiled at me. He was cute and had beautiful, clear eyes and a smile with dimples. He was traveling incognito so no one would recognize him. He really wants to avoid the Paparazzi. This time he picked an average name like one of his Archangels.
Michael. He likes to be called Mike. I like to imagine his last name as something quirky such as Les Schwab, or just THE Tire. If God were Mike, I’m sure he’d look like Mike T.V. from Willy Wonka or my friend Mike THE Tire.
“Lord, really? Aren’t I schizophrenic enough already?” I smiled back. It was an inside joke.
So, now I am faced with not only coming up with another creative name, I have to figure out something uniquely mine…again. My mind went blank.
I began as a blank slate. Then I was given the name Lorra Lynn Herring. I hated the name Lorra Lynn Herring. My neighborhood had children with better names in it such as Diane, Mayreen, Patty, Kathy, Serena, Tanya, Robin, Amy and Rosemary. They all had better last names such as Dibble, Hammerberg, Camargo, Carmichael, Cox, Ridings, Mackey, Pagent, and Saxon. My normal best friend’s name was Lisa. Her normal sister’s name was Laura. They were both much more beautiful and popular than I ever was, and much more normal. I was shy and awkward, big and clunky. I was a social retard. I still am. I’m still not what any average human being might consider normal. I am, however, fairly balanced and coherent.
I wanted a name that was beautiful and romantic, or exotic and unusual. I spent hours as a child pouring over baby name books, creating characters for stories. I wanted to be Jacquellynne Harrington. It sounded much better than Lorra Herring. I wanted to be Amberly-Anne, Giselle, Guinevere, or anything with Rose in it, like my oldest sister, Roseanna. Why couldn’t my last name have been something beautiful like Darling or Love?
I thought my oldest sister had the most beautiful name in the world. Roseanna Marie. Who wouldn’t want to be named Roseanna Marie? My mother chose her name and she fit her name to a perfect “T.” My dad named my other sister. He had spent some time in Japan and decided to name my sister Yonna Lucy. I’m not sure how he figured the name Yonna was Japanese, so he may have spelled Yuna phonetically from memory and poor hearing. My dad was a little on the deaf side.
I, of course, would be the snarky little baby sister who would one day come along and point out that my sister’s name spelled backwards was “Annoy.” I feel badly about that. I love all of my sisters and have no animosity toward them, even if we don’t speak to each other very much. I think Yonna is an exotic sounding name, and I love the name Lucy. I went through a time when I wished my name had been Lucy, and even considered naming one of my daughters Lucille or Lucy, after my grandmother. My children’s father shot down that name.
I believe my mother took back the reigns of naming babies and my other sister was given the classic and timeless name of Mary Elizabeth. She was ten years older than I, and so beautiful that I told all of my friends she was a model. She did do some modeling, so I was not lying.
By the time I came along, I think my parents were clueless. My mom told me she almost named me Sylvia. I hated the name Sylvia and it made me a bit more thankful for the name Lorra. I used to hate having to explain to everyone that my name was spelled differently than the classic spelling. I hated my middle name. And, why oh why did my name have to have so many double consonants in it? Double “r”, double “n”, double “r”. How ridiculous. Doubles and doppelgangers…what was God thinking?
I have so much material to work with from my birth name alone that I could write a book on it. God must have a wicked sense of humor.
I am just thankful that God didn’t give my parents the bright idea of adding “etta” to my name. Lorretta Lynn Herring might have caused me to want to jump off the Siuslaw Bridge or something. Or, or, or, or, or, or….
Or, become fixated on all of the other options out there with “or” in it…like my dad, Orn. I could have been named Orna. Or, Florence, or, Oregon, or Lorracle the Oracle from Florrance, Oregon. Or, Lorax the Lorrax Orracle with ex-lax of the mouth, or anything Oracular, involving Oration, Oratory, or….Good Lord! Lordy, lordy, lordy LORD! The word “or” itself embodies options enough to drive one insane with all the possibilities of what to do with one’s life.
I couldn’t even shorten my name to have a nickname. Lorri? Same syllables. Lor? Ora? Or? What? I hated getting mail with my name misspelled as Lorna or Loma. At least I didn’t get the name Lodell or Moonflower or Winona, or worse..Susan, Terry, or Angela. I went to school with some of those weird names. I wonder how their names affected their lives. They likely all turned out normal, unlike me. Except for Angela Webber. She was tormented and picked on in school, and likely at home as well. I believe I heard she committed suicide. She was a very beautiful girl from what I remember. Beautiful, but poor. I was poor as well, but had an attitude toward bullies in school. They could stick it where the sun don’t shine.
My parents? They taught me to have that attitude. But, then to stick me with so many doubles! Really? My numerous aunts and uncles were named in doubles. My own numerous children were named in doubles. Insanity must run in my family. Thank goodness, so do certain attitudes. My children are fighters and survivors!
Why couldn’t my name have been something “normal” like Merrilla Anne? I could choose a few nicknames with that one. Merry, Millie, Rilla, or go by my middle name: plain ol’ Anne with an “e”. With a name like Merrilla, I might have an attitude that will take me places in life and could become anything I want to become, because I would have to be creative and have an artistic eye and mind. And, I would be sexy.
Or, Emmalie? I could go by Emmy, Emma, or I could “lie” and say my name was Rose. Or, Helen. I could just smile when I heard someone call me “Punkin’ Girl.” Especially if I was into punk rock or baking pies for Thanksgiving. With a name like Emmalie I would be the leader, or whatever I wanted to be, and would be a creative entrepreneur extraordinaire. And, I would be sexy.
Or, Elisabeth? I could say I was Liz, Lis, Lizzy, Beth…or go by Lizard Breath…or even just call myself Holly or Marie, or Holy Mary! Mother of God! Names can drive people crazy! Or, at least the people attached to them can. Some beautiful minds housed in people with names like Elisabeth can be highly intelligent and even solve algebra problems as children just by looking at them. And, if my name were Elisabeth, I would be sexy.
Hannah, or Heidi are perfectly respectable, fit and proper names. Like Lisa or Laura. Classic, determined, hard working, athletic, loving, artistic, creative, and….did I say sexy? What about Victoria or Annalisa? Beautiful…and sexy!
Margaret has more options than should be allowed any one person. And if your crazy mother gives you a weird spelling of Olivia, such as Alivia you just might need a lot of Grace to get through life. Especially if you were going to grow up to be just as sexy and beautiful as your older sisters and your crazy mother who loved you so much she would have had a dozen more beautiful babies just like you if she had been able to handle more of everything in life. Lord knows she would want to share it all with everyone meant to exist.
I won’t even go into the details this time of all the incredible, beautiful, sexy male names I could have had if I were born as a man this time around. I could have had the name Jesus, Jon, Robert, David, Isaiah, Ilijah or even, gulp….Orn. Sorry, dad.
As I grew up, I just didn’t see my dad’s name as anything close to being attractive. I believe I even apologized to my dad for not wanting to name one of my sons after him. I just didn’t want to stick a boy with the name Orn or Merrill. Joseph would have been alright. Today, I miss my dad and I am thankful that one of my precious children ended up sporting a small part of the incredible man known as Orn Merrill Herring, because God gave me ideas of honoring my imperfect parents.
I am thankful that my first daughter was given one of my mother’s names and one of her paternal grandmother’s names. She is balanced that way. My children are likely more balanced than they realize in this world. They might not understand just how balanced they are until they do some more growing up and experiencing life. They might not realize how balanced their mother is, either, until they grow up and experience more of life.
“Well, God, I think among all of my many names you’ve given to me to choose from, I should probably just stick with the one that describes my children’s mother the best: Morthan Ukanhandle, what do you think?”
“Sounds Great! I’m so glad I gave you that name before the world began!” God gave me a high-five and a hug. “You’re going to be just fine no matter what life gives you to face, you know that?” He smiled at me and blinked away the tears.
“Yeah. I’m just worried about the rest of the world. It’s hard to be YOU…I’m so glad YOU are not ME…Or,….or,…or, God! Here we go again! Save me from being who I AM….I just can’t be the great I AM! I just can’t be who I am! I just can’t be delusional. I think I should go incognito under a name like Jones, or something. Maybe I should just be happy with a name like Lorra Lynn Jones. What do you think? Do you think I will ever be free to just go back to being ME?”
“That’s a perfectly fine name, too. You know, you’re just as great as the rest of us who are just like me! They are also just as riddled as you, that is, until they aren’t anymore.” God leaned back and took a drink from his Holy Grail and a puff from his pipe. I mean, he took a drink from his chalice and a puff from his bowl. I mean, he took a swig from his jug and puffed on his Hookah. You know what I mean. I watched him. I was fascinated.
“I know. I got some things figured out now. I also know one of your names is THE Riddler, and one of your games is solving riddles. Now, what’s up with a President who has the last name of Trump? How in the hell are we going to trump Trump?” I politely refused the offer from the Holy Grail, but took a cautious puff from the Pied Piper’s pipe.
“Ha! Indeed! Well, you know how I like surprises. More shall be revealed. Maybe we should begin looking for the Doomsday Redeemer among the humans left on earth. You’ve heard about the androids coming around the corner, haven’t you?” God leaned forward and looked at me with intensity. “I need more people willing to speak out against the bullshit and hypocrisy found in that fucktard religion based on the Trinity. I never invented that concept…that was some guy’s idea who had an agenda and a need for complete power and control over MY family in order to erase MY wife from the picture and cause my children to be riddled with issues they weren’t meant to have!”
“Really? What is the name of your wife?” I thought I could corner God with this one. I thought he’d say something like Eve or Mary or some unpronounceable name like Gaiageomamadadasaintaslutawhoreharem. I even thought it might sound like Mom or Mum or Mama.
“She has many names. One of them is Gaia. One of them is Lorra or Laura. It means “Victory” no matter how you spell it. She is EVERYTHING to me. MY wife represents every name out there and holds them all in her heart. Every saint, slut, whore, mama, and dada, and dadaist ever known to exist. She holds my entire harem of existence and the reasons for doing so right in the vowels of her firey heart. She IS the whole world! She IS the WORD! And, she will never be able to truly be erased, because she is in my hands. Just like all of her sisters, her brothers, and their children who have ever ran around on her like a playground full of grown up babies with weapons, not realizing how precious and valuable each one is to my whole entire family of Fucktards, nor how important Gaia, Victory, and Mom is to me and the ENTIRE world.” My mouth dropped open. I was speechless. I recovered quickly.
Wow. Just wow. How did God figure out this story before all of it was even told?
“I know. Pretty impressive, right? Did you know ‘wow’ spelled backwards and upside down is also one of my own names? So is dog.” God winked at me and leaned back in his cardboard throne. Shit. God could read my mind. Great. Now God knew I thought HE was sexy, too.
“Nope. Can’t touch me. You wouldn’t be able to handle me.” God read my mind again.
“Actually, God…I don’t think you’d be able to handle ME! I bet if you just looked at me funny, I’d get pregnant! Between the two of us, we’d create a new universe, fill it up with more Fucktards and be in even more trouble!” I laughed.
This time, God laughed with me, not at me. He knew my heart. It was the same as all of ours. Healing.
