Bizarre Encounters

I am horrible at remembering peoples' names. Heck, I am horrible at remembering people! Sometimes I remember the face but not the name, sometimes (less times) I remember the name but not the face, but most of the time I remember neither. So many times I have been walking around on campus (or off campus, but most of my time is spent on campus, so that is where I see most of the people) and people will wave at me, come up to talk to me, or say hello. I, of course, reply in a friendly manner, but inside I am thinking, "how do I know you? Is there a non-awkward way to ask your name, since you know mine?"

I was glad to discover last week that this is not only a problem with me. My friend Jane and I were at the Springville art museum (they have some cool stuff there, by the way), walking through one of the galleries, and this guy with his girlfriend says "Hi Jane!" and starts talking to her about what she is doing this summer, etc. After a 4-5 minute conversation, we walked away, and Jane turned to me and said, "Breanne, I have no idea who that was!"

I laughed hysterically. She pulled it off pretty well, though; I never would have guessed!

So then we were walking down the stairs when another guy and his girlfriend came walking up the stairs. As he passed me, he said, "Hi Breanne! How are you?" Thankfully there were people behind both of us wanting to keep moving so I just smiled and nodded.

And then I turned around and Jane looked at me expectantly. "Nope," I said. "I have no clue who that was."

Weird, huh.

Which is what makes today's story even weirder. I was walking to the library across a deserted campus. It was approaching 9pm and I just had to go in and grab a book before I headed home for the evening. I saw a girl walking perpendicular to my path and I realized that if we continued at the same speed we would bump into each other (I think about weird things like this when walking to the library) so I slowed down, avoiding eye contact, and tried to let her pass so I could cross behind her.

She stopped, looked me in the eye, and said "I know you from somewhere."

I looked up at her and immediately thought, "You were in my Honors 200 class in fall of 2005."

But I didn't say that. I mean, there is no way I could remember who she was, especially from 5 years ago. So we played that "where do I know you from" game and realized that she was in the MTC at the same time as me and sisters from the other Chinese district going to Taiwan were her roommates. I said, "Oh, we must have seen each other there," smiled courteously, and turned to leave.

But then! She didn't move, kept staring at me, and said, "No, I know you from somewhere other than the MTC." And once again I thought, "Honors 200 Fall 2005." Pushing that thought away, we tried a couple more options (but was this really important? That's what I thought, anyway) and finally I said, "This is crazy, but were you take Honors 200 in Fall 2005?" (And I thought to myself, I don't know why I would remember you, because I don't even remember the teacher's name!)

And she said, "Yes!!"

Grateful we got that figured out, we parted ways. And I thought, how bizarre. I have never remembered where I know a person from with that clarity before.

Weird, huh.