SAA Ep. #41: Not Remembering Having Met People

I took the girls I watch to the pool today.  Since I had cleverly packed a bag full of my swimming stuff and cleverly forgotten it and left it on my bed in my apartment, I was not able to go swimming with them.  So I sat nicely shaded at one of those awesome tables with a huge umbrella and still somehow managed to get a sunburn.

I'd been there about twenty minutes when one of the moms from the neighborhood came up and started talking to me as if she'd known me my entire life.  "I saw you over here and wanted to come see how you were doing."

Now, usually I'm terrible with names, but good with faces.  I've gone to the same church for five and a half years.  I've sung in the choir for about four of those years.  There are still names of people in the choir that I just don't know.  There are many more people in the church whose names I just don't know.  But I know their faces.  If I've met someone even once, I usually at least remember the person's face.  This person?  Well, I had no idea who she was.  I mean, she WAS wearing sunglasses, so I guess that might have thrown me a little.  As she started talking, I just figured that she was someone I'd met once or twice and maybe shared a "gee aren't these kids so cute" moment.

But then this lady asked me a question that led me to believe that we've had more than just a superficial conversation.  As I was trying to figure out who she was, she asked me, "So how is your book going?"

I looked down at my hands, at the book that I was reading, wondering if she were possibly talking about that.  But no.  She had that annoying look that accompanies every person who asks that dreaded question, "How is your book going?"

I kind of made one of those "so-so" hand gestures and managed a weak smile.  She said something else before departing.  I can't remember what it was.  I was too busy trying to figure out when I'd had a conversation with her about the fact that I write books.  I mean, I just don't go up to strangers and say, "Hi!  My name is Ruth!  I write books!  I like Dragons!  My second favorite color is maroon!  I'm obsessed with Rich Mullins!  My sister once got bitten by a muskrat!  Be my best friend EVER!"  Maybe if I did, I'd have more friends, but somehow I doubt it.  There is a reason someone like me was born inside a shell.  The figurative kind--not the candy coated kind.  I think being an M&M would be slightly problematic for me.  I am reminded of Spaceballs when "Pizza the Hutt" ate himself to death.  If I were an M&M, my fate would be similar.

AND...back to my story.

The only thing I can figure is that either I was completely out of it when I did meet and speak with this person, or I really have only had surface level conversations with her and other people have been talking to her about me behind my back.  I don't really like to think about people talking about me because 1) my writing and I aren't cool enough to be the subject of almost total strangers' conversations and 2) that kind of thinking makes me seem paranoid--and I'm finally just now starting to get used to the idea that "THEY" probably aren't all out to get me.

But then there was this one time in college where I walked into the office of my new advisor, an English professor.  I never had the privilege of taking this lady's class, and I'd never spoken to her before.  But I sat down at her desk and the first words out of her mouth were, "So I hear you're a wonderful writer."  Apparently the English department HAD been talking about me.  And "THEY" might have even been out to get me. 

So I'm really not sure what happened, but apparently I meet people and then forget about it later.  Maybe I have amnesia.  Maybe "THEY" came and got me and erased my memory of having met this person.  How many other people have "THEY" made me forget?  What other things have "THEY" done to me?

I'mma go hide in my room now...

...and put tin foil on my head...

...just for good measure...