I would like to thank sailorm72003 for editing my work, spotting all the missing commas and typos and making sense of my complicated sentence structure and gibberish; and for sticking to it even with all the problems with his computer. His comments have helped me a lot. :)
* * * * * * * * * *
Once upon a time, there was a man called Adam. Incidentally, he was also the first man. First in what you ask? What a question! The first to be created, silly. So now that we have the identity problem behind us, let’s get right on with the story.
Adam lived in a garden. Now the intelligent among you might find that sentence and the circumstance really ridiculous. I mean NO ONE lives in a garden for Chrissakes! But, well, this guy did. No kidding. Really! This garden was called the Garden of Eden. At this point, a quick AskJeeves search tells me that Eden means ‘pleasure’ in Hebrew. Therefore the Garden of Eden was so named because God wanted man to have pleasure. What kind of pleasure? We will explore that a bit as the story progresses.
Adam lived there with a woman called Eve. Eve was the first woman. Which makes them the first couple. Adam and Eve were the only people alive then. I know what you are thinking! Lucky Adam, right? Of course Adam was lucky. If you do not believe it now, you will by the time this story is finished. Well, on with the story.
One fine day, Adam had this weird urge to chase Eve around the garden they lived in. He couldn’t understand it. Let us dwell a while on why he couldn’t understand it. See, he had barely been created a few weeks ago; and when you think about it, think really deeply here, he had been created in an adult form, not as a baby. So while he had a full-grown man’s body, he didn’t have the experiences to match; and his mental capabilities had yet to catch up to his physical development. Therefore it is quite natural and logical that he didn’t understand why he felt the sudden, absolute desire to chase after Eve that day. In retrospect, he would decide that his basic instincts were responsible for his behaviour, but he would not know that until later.
The chase went on for quite a while. Eve in front. Adam following. Eve running. Adam pursuing. They ran through the beautiful bounty of nature that God had prepared for them, scarcely noticing the beauty or the bounty, because they were otherwise occupied at the moment. Eve passed
the
apple tree twice, but she ran right on without stopping to sample the forbidden fruit because, as mentioned before, she was otherwise occupied.
It ended when Eve decided that she had had enough of Adam’s childish game, for that was what she thought it was. She stopped abruptly and Adam ran smack into her. As Eve turned to nag at him for this display of rude behaviour, Adam's horny hormones overcame him and his hands were suddenly all over Eve. Eve didn’t like this one bit. No sir. Not one tiny bit. She proceeded to convey this to Adam in no uncertain terms.
“Down Adam. Down boy. DOWN!” The last was screeched in a shrill voice which Adam had learned to obey because if he didn’t, Eve would refuse to do his work for him and he had to patch up his loin-leaf himself. He could do it if it became an absolute necessity, like the terrible time he had when Eve had not yet been made, but then Adam was a firm believer in ‘Do not do unto thyself what Eve can do for thee.’ Hence, Adam followed Eve’s high-pitched instruction and downed.
This episode had a profound and ever-lasting effect on Adam. If Freud had been created before Adam, he would have said so too. In fact, Freud would have had a LOT to say about Adam, but let’s not get into that. So due to this incident, Adam's mind was a host of confused, humbled and embarrassed feelings. Therefore, Adam decided to do what Adam thought was the best. He decided to have a counselling session with God.
Thus, making up his mind, Adam immediately scampered over to God’s angel-secretary and made an appointment. He stressed that it was urgent, and considering the fact that God had made it known that Adam was his best creation, it was no surprise that he benefited from the favouritism and was pushed to the front of the line.
That same afternoon, Adam entered God’s private chambers. God was tinkering with a teeny little galaxy which he would blow up and hook into the system when he was done with the mechanics, but as soon as Adam came in, God set the galaxy aside and welcomed Adam.
“Hiya AD. What brings you here? Something wrong with that playground I made for you?”
Adam took exception to being called AD. “Please God. Can you not call me with that infernal shortening of my given name? As it is I suffer from the ignominy of not having a surname. And coming back to the point I was making – AD?? What sort of a dumbass name is AD? Just call me Adam.”
“Oh, quit whining Adam. Act your age, will you? What’s in a name? A rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” A slow realisation dawned on God, like a sunrise in slow motion, and God seemed stunned by the inspirational remark He had just uttered. “I should write this down somewhere,” He muttered absentmindedly. “The future of mankind would love it!” and He proceeded to hunt for a quill and a scroll.
Adam jumped forward and supplied the materials and God wrote it down in an illegible scrawl. Why illegible? Well, surely all of us know that great minds have an indecipherable handwriting.
When the thought was written down and safely locked away in God’s office safe, He transferred his full attention to Adam. “Tell me Addy…” then, seeing Adam's look, He repaired the faux pas, “errr… Adam. What brings thee here? Art thou in need of certain favours?”
Adam was pissed off with the AD stuff already and he was tired of the ‘thee thou’ bit too. “Lay off that archaic lingo please. Who would want to talk that way? It’s so passé.”
God came around his desk and put his arm around Adam. It was now apparent that Adam was suffering from something he had not experienced before. With God’s gentle coaxing, Adam poured forth the whole story.
“Why, God. Why? Why was I chasing Eve around the Garden of Eden,” Adam asked with a trace of desperation in his voice.
“Adam, Adam. Relax, child. All will be revealed. Actually, I am so glad you asked me this question. I had been waiting for this day for a long time. You have finally grown up Adam. This means the child within you has reached puberty. I have prepared some directives for you to be opened on the day when you ask me this question, for I feel too awkward telling it to you. You can read the scrolls I will hand over to you presently. But first I must tell you
something. Tell me, what is the name of the garden I created for you?”
Adam screwed up his brow. “Sheesh God. Is this like a pop quiz now?”