remember me?

After moving to a place where I didn't know anyone and being biologically compelled to form social bonds with strangers, in pretty short order I thought I had the people I met figured out.

I had the people I liked, and the people I didn't like. There was a large variety of criteria employed to decide which group each person went into, but I noticed after the fact a very striking thing: everyone who I had put into the "don't like" group casually asked me the same questions about myself, that I had already answered directly to them before. I noticed that if I said "I already told you" they were a bit off-put, so then I tried just answering again. To my wonder, this didn't jog most of their memories, and they responded in a way that was quite similar to how they responded the first time they asked the question.

Occasionally I like to give people the benefit of the doubt, particularly when it comes to matters of memory, so as not to have my glass house broken. But why is it that no one who was on the "do like" list has any problems remembering what I've told them? And why is it I remember factual conversations with everyone, including people I don't like?

Because for all my huffing and puffing, I am interested in people. If they volunteer information about themselves, or I volunteer information about myself, it is, on some basic level, important. I don't often indulge in small talk because to me, no talk is small.

I may not remember the calendar date(or day of the week), how many cups of coffee I had this morning or "that one time" but I do keep a keen record of what the people who surround me think they are, what they are doing and what they know about me. Not only is it personally upsetting when someone doesn't remember something personal you told them, it crosses your mind that the person is entirely self-absorbed in exactly the wrong ways.


Try to apply this litmus test for feelings of kinship in your life. I bet it checks out.