What's in a Name?

I pushed my license across the glass counter to the cashier.

She picked it up and paused for a moment.

"Aidan Scott Lawrence...wait...are you THAT Aidan Lawrence?"

I sighed.

"Yeah...don't you just need to read my birthday?" I asked exasperatedly.

After calling over a few of her coworkers to gawk and stare at me, the young woman finally let me pay for my cannabis and leave.

That's when I decided to change my name.

A few days later, I waited patiently at the Board of Motor Vehicles, and when my name was called, a bald mustachioed man beckoned me to follow him through a door into the back.

I strolled through the door, and sat across from him at a small table.

"I'm afraid there's a problem. We can't change your name because your current name is in question," he said, a spark in his blue eyes.

"W..what do you mean? It...it's right here on my license." I stammered.

"That's a piece of plastic, my boy."

"Excuse me?" I replied. "That...that's my legal name."

He grinned. "Under which legal system?" he inquired. "I'm afraid I have access to your permanent record, and I know better. You claim to be an Aidan? Who have you ever aided? And you're definitely more out than in, at this juncture.

Nope, you seem more like a Pat to me.

As for Lawrence, what laws do you rinse? Unfortunately there's more to a name than just ink and plastic. It carries responsibility, boy."

I glared at him. "I just drove my homeless friend Jodie to work about 20 times. Is that enough aid for an appeal, comrade?"

"Ahh...a communist bureaucrat joke. I admit you've got moxy kid, but I still can't change your name," he said.

I groaned.

"Listen Mr. Moustache," I said. "I just want to stop being harassed by celebrity chasers. Can we please change the names on my government papers?"

"Ahh..you think you're being harassed, but we know that you're doing that to yourself. Your permanent record is quite illuminating. For instance..."

At this, he paused his speech and leaned over in his chair to pick up a large box of file folders.

He pulled out a file and opened it to the first page, then glanced back up at me.

"We know that the young woman at the dispensary...yes, we know that troubled you...we know that she's you 15 lives after your current one. The strange meth addict that showed up at your house uninvited, because she found your deed on a google search? We know she's you 34 lives from now."

"See Aidan? You've been doing this to yourself. You've been harrassing yourself. You haven't aided anyone else, because you are everyone else. We know your real name. I know your real name. It's God."

I stood up and walked out of the building, mumbling "consider the source" to myself. An effective mantra.