I Wish I Was Bad at Names

Everybody’s had it happen. It’s a universal experience. You're walking, in your own little world, minding your own business, when suddenly someone yells your name. It’s jarring. It cuts through the noise of everyday life so aggressively that you can’t help but stop what you’re doing. Your head snaps up, you look around for a familiar face. BOOM! You hear it again. You do a 180 and still none of the faces around you ring a bell. Then you spot someone. They’re making a beeline for you, waving, smiling, blissfully unaware that you’re quietly shitting yourself. You’re trying to string together advanced algorithms to somehow figure out who this person is before they get to you. But nothing... The ensuing conversation is a skillful dance of trying to substitute their name-you-don’t-know with man, dude, or any regional variations of the word bro (bro-seph, bro-ski, bro-chacho...). That happens to everybody, maybe you handle it better than I do (probably) but it happens.

Then there’s the people that blatantly get your name wrong. I mean at least they tried right? I mean it was a terrible try but still. Just the other day I had the ego crumbling moment of being called the wrong name. At first I thought he was throwing a bro or dude on the end of a “what’s up”. Then it dawned on me that oh, wait, no, this dude is calling me Peter. YO! I’ve been here for like 2 months and Peter is nowhere close to Jamie so... I’ma have to call you out on that. Sometimes you need that when you're feeling especially memorable. Like the universe is telling you that you look like a Peter and Peter is memorable as fuck. I like to think that somewhere out there a Peter is getting called Jamie just to balance things out.

Now, these kinds of narratives are well documented. But we rarely ever think about the other guy? The rememberer. You never hear, “Oh man it was so awkward I remembered their name but they totally forgot mine!” People just don’t want to talk about that time someone forgot who they were. But it is easily 100 times worse when you’re talking to somebody and are slowly coming to the realization that they have no idea what your name is. Do you understand how not awesome that makes you feel? That someone you’re talking to doesn’t know your name and still plows on with the conversation like you’ve never done the exact same thing? It sucks! It’s so common to say, “Oh I’m so bad with names,” like that gives you a free pass to not give a shit.

All the people that are even half decent at remembering names have been forced to conform to some “no one should ever remember anybody’s name” BS and it’s totally unfair. Do you know how many people I’ve had to pretend like I didn’t know exactly who they were, just to avoid looking like some kind of weird, remembering, stalker-person? A lot. If I’ve met you and we talked for more than 10 minutes I’m probably going to remember you. If we’re Facebook friends I have a pretty good idea who you are even if you shot me a friend request and we haven’t talked since.

Don’t worry people, I’m not about to run up to you every time I see you and aggressively pressure you to remember me because I know you’re name, (and probably the last 14 memes you’ve shared on Facebook). But I am definitely encouraging the use of subtle social pressures. Use their name and keep using their name even after you realize they have no idea what yours is. Stop the inner monologue of, “Wow they don’t even know my name... I must be boring, unremarkable, forgettable...” Make them nervous, make them uncomfortable, make them feel shitty. Then maybe they’ll remember your name...or they’ll just avoid you forever. Which isn’t the worst thing either.