Pride + Amnesia = Pridnesia

Going home for the holidays is always interesting. Especially when you run into people you went to high school with. This is the sole cause of anxiety in my life when I go back home. These people are everywhere. Lurking around aisles at the grocery store, waiting in line at Starbucks, the next table over at Chili's. And the worst thing about these people is that I have completely forgotten all of their names. And this is why I get so tense around them. This is why I avoid them at all cost. It's the awkwardness of it all that drives me into hiding.

I see their face and the visual sparks some far off memory, lodged deep in the back of my mind where I rarely ever venture. The memories are so covered in dust that I can faintly recall that I do know them but have no clue where I know them from. And of course trying to retrieve a name to go with the fuzzy and foggy memory is out of the question. If people are not in the context that you knew them, it is very hard to peg them into a familiar hole in your head.

For years whenever I came home, I would awkwardly go with the conversation. "Hey...you," would be my response to them calling out my name and walking towards me with an extended hand. And I'd stand there for the next few minutes shaking and sweating and asking them questions and tip toeing around the conversation for clues as to who they might be. The fear of getting caught not knowing their name drove me insane. I couldn't take it. And so if I saw anyone that I faintly recognized, I would duck and hide and dodge. I'd grab my cell phone and quickly press it against my face to engage in a fake conversation that seemed so important it was understandable that I couldn't talk right then.

But not this trip. Not this time. I graduated in 1999. That is almost 7 years ago. I have come to the point in my life that I am willing to openly acknowledge the fact that I have forgotten people's names. By now, it should be understandable. And if someone actually gets upset that I have forgotten their name, they have major problems. After 7 years of not seeing someone, you have the right to forget. To be upset that your name was not remembered after 7 years exposes the ugliness of pride like lifting a rock and seeing the black, slithery, shiny insect underneath. "What?!?! You don't remember my name??" Give me a break.

And that's what I did. And nobody got upset. And it was wonderful to be freed from the self-imposed social chains. So from here on out, I'm asking. If I have forgotten (and I most likely have), don't be offended. You are not as important as you think.

By the way, I am writing this in a coffee shop back in Baton Rouge. And there is a grown, Indian woman a table over from me with a "Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen" bookbag at her feet. Ah, it's good to be back home.