I can't remember your name.
Seriously, I really can't. If I
run into you in public, please
show a little mercy as I stammer
around, pretending I do. There's
a word for my particular
affliction: lethonomia. No, no,
this is not an episode of
Spectacular Vernacular, though I
can't resist telling you about
this magnificent, obscure little
word. Thanks to some dusty
corner of my brain where high
school Greek mythology went to
die. I can tell you Lethe is one
of the five rivers of Hades.
Drink from its waters, and you
forget your past. And the
daughter of Eris, Lethe, is the
goddess of forgetfulness and
oblivion. Hey, you, back row,
stop yawning. I promise this is
leading to a good story, so hang
in there. The second part, nomia,
evolved from the Greek word for
name, onoma. So, lethonomia —
the inability to recall names.
It's a very real condition. I
know. I have it. My brain is a
steel trap for useless trivia,
such as the obscure word
lethonomia, but a Teflon pan for
the names of people I've met. I
am insanely jealous of friends
who are masters of recall.
They'll bump into someone on the
street, and launch into a full
biographical update. Bob! Is
that you? Man, it must be 40
years. How's your wife Mary? And
the kids? Jason, Tonya, Billy,
and Sally? All this for someone
they met once, briefly, at a
sparsely attended art gallery
opening in 1983. Me? I run into
someone vaguely familiar in the
grocery store and my brain
becomes a dial-up modem from
1995, screeching and sputtering
as it tries to connect to a
server that no longer exists.
All I can manage is a panicked,
"Oh hi, uh you." They'll give me
a pitying look and say, "I'm
George, your neighbor. We share
a fence." I always claim it's a
context thing. See, if I see
George in his yard, wrestling
with his rogue sprinkler head,
I'll cheerfully call out,
"Morning, George." Well, most of
the time, I have been known to
call him Gary or even Max. But
put George in the dairy aisle,
and he might as well be a
complete stranger trying to sell
me a timeshare. Worst of all, I
can't even blame genetics. My
father was one of those people
who knew everyone's name. Some
sort of black magic was at work.
We'd be running errands in town,
and he couldn't take ten steps
without someone stopping him.
He'd grin, clap them on the
shoulder, and rattle off their
names without a single bead of
sweat. I was stumped. "How do
you do that?" I'd ask.
"Associate their name with
something about them," he'd say.
As if it were that simple.
"Roger has red hair." See how
easy that is? Sure enough, the
next time I saw a man with red
hair, I'd confidently blurt out,
"Richard!" Figuring the R sound
was close enough for government
work. He'd roll his eyes. "It's
Tim." One day, my father offered
a huge confession. Sometimes, he
admitted, "I don't have a clue."
Aha! He's human! A shocking
conclusion for any kid. "What do
you do then?" "Make it easy for
them," he'd say, "to tell you
their name." He demonstrated
when we ran across a forgotten
acquaintance of his. He stuck
out his hand and boomed, "Long
time no see. I'm Don." The guy
smiled and replied, "Hi, Don.
Great to see you. I'm Jerome."
Genius. Simple. Foolproof. So I
tried it. I saw a familiar face
at the office coffee machine. I
stuck out my hand with practice
confidence. "Hi. I'm Kirk." He
looked at me with a blank,
pitying stare. "I know. We've
worked in the same office for
three years." He'd walk away,
leaving me hanging. To this day.
I still don't know who he was.
Which brings me to my story.
After college, I joined one of
those big international
accounting firms. Prestige.
Glamour. At least so it claimed
in their recruiting brochures.
One of their requirements was
that we attended those
after-work networking mixers —
a personal circle of hell for
someone with lethonomia. A room
buzzing with forced gayety,
smelling of ambition and
lukewarm hors d'oeuvres. My only
goal was to survive without
trying to hand my business card
to my own boss. Naturally,
knowing my weakness, I
gravitated toward events where
participants wore name tags.
There, at least, I had a
fighting chance. Provided I
recognized the person in the
first place and realized I knew
them, and their handwriting was
legible, and the name tag wasn't
flipped over or hidden under a
lapel. After one such event, my
social battery wasn't just low,
it was leaking acid. All I
wanted to do was go home and
collapse on the couch with some
junk food. But when I climbed
into my poor car, parked in a
remote corner of the parking lot
so no one knew what a clunker I
drove, I discovered my gas gauge
was kissing empty. Desperate to
get home and sulk in my personal
cave, I pulled into the very
first convenience store I saw, a
place I had never entered. Now,
for my younger fans, this
occurred back in the prehistoric
period before you could just tap
a card at the pump and avoid
human interaction. No, I had to
go inside. I grabbed a dubiously
constructed pastry—this was
long before I started counting
calories—and approached the
counter. The cashier, a guy
about my age, was engrossed in a
magazine. He looked up as I
approached, and his face lit up
as if he had just seen a winning
lottery ticket walk through the
door. Well, I'll be, he said,
his voice full of genuine
delight. Kirk, how are you doing?
I froze. My mind was a snow
globe of forgotten faces,
floating in a haze of memory.
Nothing. Not a flicker of
recognition. I couldn't even use
my father's trick, not that it
had ever worked. He had already
called me by my name. I fell
back on my trusty, pathetic
standby. Oh, hi. Good to see you.
He shook his head, still beaming.
Man, it's been a long time, Kirk.
Twice. He called me by name.
Twice. Without a hint of
hesitation. Meanwhile, I was
drowning in a sea of anonymity.
Yeah, I mumbled. It's been ages.
I can't believe high school was
so long ago, he sighed wistfully.
Aha! A clue! I deployed another
of my father's tactics.
Association. Oh, yeah.
Especially that one class we had.
What was that teacher's name
again? I asked, hoping for a
memory jog. He laughed. Which
one? Seemed like we had every
class together. I was now
hopelessly lost. Frantically
racking my brain. If only this
were a corporate chain
convenience store where he'd be
wearing a uniform and a name tag.
But no such luck. Just jeans and
a t-shirt. He kept jabbering as
if we were long lost best
friends. Hey, have you heard
from Maria? I haven't seen her
in forever. Maria? I wasn't sure
I remembered a Maria. But that
didn't mean she didn't exist. I
didn't have time to resolve that
mystery because he continued to
fire names at me like a verbal
machine gun. Barbara? Mike? Pam?
Brent? I just shook my head. My
panic rising with each mention
of some forgotten classmate.
Desperate to escape, I paid for
my gas and my pastry. He rang up
the sale but paused as he
tortured me with another
remember when story. When he
finally handed me my change, the
transaction was complete. I had
my freedom. It was great seeing
you, I said, already turning to
flee. Hey, Kirk, he called out.
Before you go. I turned back.
Bracing myself. He pointed a
finger at my chest. A huge grin
spreading across his face. You
really should take that thing
off when you leave. Confused, I
looked down. Stuck to my suit
was a name tag from the
networking event. Proudly
displaying my name in large
block letters — Kirk.
He had me. Hook, line, and
sinker. I can still hear his
laughter echoing in that little
store. You know what I did? I
laughed with him. It didn't
matter I was the butt of the
joke. It was hilarious. Utterly
brilliant. Perfectly played. He
reached out for a handshake, a
peace offering, to assure me it
was all in fun, and uttered
words I'll never forget. Thanks