As another Lame Cherry exclusive in matter anti matter.
I really do not know my name. I think a great deal too much is put into a name. In fact if you wave a sausage at a hungry man, you do not need to know his name as he will come. Wave a lottery ticket at anyone, and they will come. So my not really knowing my name is not such an important thing at all.
It is not that I do not know my name. I simply do not know if I ever had a real name as my origins as I was told seemed to change with the person who was telling me the story.
For example, Sister Mandrake told me as a child, that I appeared in a great flood, washed out of Texas and into Mexico, riding a bull rush ark, and sounding a great deal like Noah and Moses.
Lupe, who had no last name often told me that I was discovered on the doorstep with a note, written in English, but as she could not read English she did not know what it said.
Old Padre Pete insisted time and again that if I sat right back I would hear a tale, a tale of a fateful trip, that started from a tropic port, upon a tiny ship.
I did not ever understand who the Skipper and Gilligan were, but suspected it may have been my mother and father.
I was known as Nomina Nyquil though throughout my days as an orphan, and it appears that the source was closest to a drunken lawyer who slurred something like, "No name mumble mumble Nyquil", followed by, "I have cold".
I had great hopes that I was the heiress to Nyquil, but when I wrote to inquire if the Nyquil family was missing any children who were lost in a bull rush ark, whose parents were Mr. Skipper Nyquil and Mrs. Gilligan Nyquil, no response ever was made in letter, but by phone I was told I would be reported to the authorites for being a naughty girl.
About the time I was 4 years old, a Christian couple arrived who told the orphanage, that they would like to place the children there into homes, by offering enticements of 5000 dollars to people who would adopt the children.
I do not remember any other children there, but the Sister of Merciful Mary, not Virgin, but there was a monkey there which had more offers than me.
I was adopted though first by a woman who looked a great deal like Faye Dunaway. She had very large eyes and larger fake eyelashes. I recall that our time together was invested in me being dressed up in a smaller version of her. I remember the eyelashes were quite heavy and I looked like I suffered from a sleeping sickness.
I remember a great deal of vitamins and health food bars. It all ended abruptly though when she took me out, and people gave me more attention than they did her.
My second adoption was to a couple named Gwenyth and Paul. I was locked in a basement with a large pool table and a broken television. A bag of groceries would appear once a week which contained Froot Loops, peanut butter, bread, tuna fish, toilet tissue, toothpaste and powdered milk.
I listened a great deal to soap operas and other times the fights between Gwenyth and Paul. Sometimes it was difficult to tell.
One day a police officer came and took them away, and opened the door to the basement. We had Froot Loops and shared them with Mousie, a mouse which was my friend.
Sister Maybelline watched over me after this. I recall she called me an abomination, incubus, septic reaction and some things in Latin.
She enjoyed beating my fingers with a ruler, making me get on me knees with beads in my hand as I told things to a statue which had the head broke off.
After this, I was adopted again by a fat woman named fat woman. Fat woman loved to feed me oatmeal. I ate oatmeal morning, noon and night. Nothing else on it, just oatmeal. I remember I spent a great deal of time cleaning the house which seemed to have a great deal of dirt in it for one fat woman who only moved at snail speed from a recliner to the toilet.
One day she quit moving and I was back at the orphanage again.
Sister Maybelline was still there, but I was put under the charge of Lupe at this time. Lupe told me the moon was made of green cheese and that if I ate too much sugar I would get worms.
Not so long after that, I was adopted by a family in a Winnebago. We made it to the gas station, where for some reason they failed to wait for me, after they told me to take the money in to pay for the gas. The sheriff took me back to the orphanage.
After this I was adopted by a horse. At least that is what I think, as I slept in a barn, cleaned the barn, drank water from the horse tank and talked to the horse. The horse was magical though in prepared meals would appear on the bale pile.
I think the horse took me back when I was asleep, as I woke up on the steps of the orphanage again.
Next I was adopted by the Mormons. They had 57 children and 14 wives. The number of children sort of went up and down as they lost children on outings, but never the wives.
I was told the Mr. had wanted the 5000 dollars for to buy shoes for everyone. I soon enough got lost and fortunately was found by Mother Superior, who was on her way to the orphanage.
Apparently the people who were putting up the money to get me adopted, had told the nuns that they could not donate any more to them, as adopting me out had cost them 30,000 dollars. Mother Superior told me that I was was only going out for free after that as they needed the donation.
That was 15 years ago and interestingly, Sister Maybelline died, Lupe died and Old Padre Pete died, by the time I was 10 so I got the 5000 dollar donations each year, saved 3000 dollars as I figured it was sinful to waste money, and last week the new Mother Superior said she was closing the orphanage and selling it. I bought it for 30,000 dollars and I rent it out to vacationers who want to have a real orphanage experience.
I name them after medicinal products, let them sleep on floors and beat them with rulers. It goes over really well as they tell all their friends and I get offers from investors to franchise the real orphan experience.
I never did figure out who the Merciful Mary was, only she was not the Virgin one.
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