I have trouble with names. You might think it funny, but it’s a serious relational problem that affects how I get along with many friends and co-workers, including the one lady with the grayish hair (is the Marianne? Or Jean?) and the one with glasses downstairs (maybe that’s Marianne!). Well, you get the picture.
I’m not in the habit of blaming my parents for my problems—whatever is wrong with me, I'm sure it's my fault—but this is a problem I might have inherited from my father. With five boys in eight years there was bound to be some confusion, but he was (and is) wildly inaccurate when calling his sons by name. A longtime running joke has been that he ought to owe each offended party $5 per occurrence, but of course he’d never really agree to that. It would be far too expensive. In the past two years he’s even started to confuse his one easy name (his only daughter Martha) with his first grandchild. In his defense, I’ve slipped into calling Hayden “Martha” several times myself. Dad’s defense? We should simplify, and all wear name-tags. Working now at LCS, two Hochstein campuses, GPC, RPO, and BPO, I’m starting to see how this might be a good idea.
I started to get a sense of my troubles when I worked at NDHS, fresh out of graduate school. For the first week of school, I didn’t know anyone’s name except the principal, who hired me. I soon learned my immediate neighbors, the choral teacher and phys ed teachers…but the rest of the school was unknown to me. I picked up from the student jabber that so-and-so must be the Spanish teacher, and so-and-so was math. I recognized, just by leaving and entering the building, most of the faces of my fellow faculty, but still couldn’t pair the names with the faces particularly well. “Oh well,” I said to myself “You’re still new and with time you’ll figure out who’s who.” I trusted in my well-practiced tradition of talking in a friendly and familiar manner without ever actually using a person’s name. I was very subtle, as you’ll see from these actual examples of my friendly greetings:
“Well, hello! And how are you?”
“Good morning to you *indistinct monosyllable*, how are you today?”
“I’m well…sir, how are you?”
Eventually it was Christmas break, and I was no longer able to use my backup line, which was “You’ll have to forgive me because I’m new and I’m afraid that in the course of learning everyone’s names yours seems to have slipped away.” I was no longer new. Everyone knew who I was, and I still knew only
1) The chorus teacher 2) The phys ed teacher 3) The principal and 4) The vice principal, except when actually speaking in person with the vice principal, at which point I couldn’t for the life of me recall his name.
“It’s alright” I reassured myself “You’ll eventually learn all of these names by osmosis. Just keep on listening into conversation…maybe check a yearbook out of the library, and you’ll figure out who everyone is.”
In June I gave notice that I wouldn’t be returning to my position, because my wife and I were moving to North Carolina. Then it struck me: I had worked at NDHS for a whole academic year and made no progress in learning the names of the others. The best I could do was still the choral teacher, the gym teacher, the principal, and (sometimes) the vice principal.
I didn’t fare much better in North Carolina. We attempted to get to know our neighbors, but many of them had foreign star-system names like Shafawnda and Tatooine. I found work at a local contractor, and steadily worked my way up the ranks for two years. By the time I left I knew about six or seven names, but this wasn’t terribly important since everyone there, being of the burly construction variety, called each other “man” or dude.” Knowing one another's names wasn’t nearly as important as knowing the football rooting interests, which, of course, I still remember quite clearly.
When we moved back to New York, I was a substitute teacher and knew no one’s names. This might have been my undoing. My already feeble onomatic-memory-function was exhausted beyond repair, and quietly went off to die somewhere in a dark corner of my brain. Every day I met a new classroom of students and a new wing of teachers. (Free Advice: A talent for remembering names is very handy as a substitute teacher. If you can quickly learn and use your students names, they will develop an uneasy sense that they are responsible for what they do around you. If your onomatic-memory-function is dead, they will deliberately try to hit you in the face with kickballs) You’d think I should be excused from remembering these names, but here’s the sad truth: I was subbing in my hometown district, where I went to school for 10 years! I’d had many of these nameless teachers, and sat in their classes for (especially the gym teachers) 30 or 40 years.
Around this time I also took up the post of music director of the CPC choir. At the beginning, it was fine for me to ask “and sorry, what’s your name again?” After all, I had 25 chorister’s names to learn! But what about now, when I’ve been doing the job for over two years and still can only name one alto with any confidence?
It’s the same thing at LCS. I know 1) the choral teacher 2) the gym teacher 3) my principal 4) the vice-principal 5) my co-homeroom teacher. (As you see, I made some improvement over NDHS) One of my New Year’s Resolutions was to find some way to learn the names of the other staff. Here’s the problem: the old yearbooks are in the library, but I’ve forgotten the librarian’s name! (And she, of course, cordially greets me by name every time I see her.)
This problem has even interfered with our Christian duties of hospitality and neighbor-love. I’ve always thought the world of our next-door neighbors (we share a duplex) but for a long time I haven’t had the faintest idea who they are. They introduced themselves when they moved in, and I asked for their names again at least once or twice afterward. Time went by, and the “window-of-not-being-able-to-ask-again-without-it-being-really-awkward” passed. I considered sneaking through their mail. I was fairly certain that the son was Bailey (or was that the dog?) the mother was Lori, and the father was either “Bob” or “Dave.” I attempted to blend the two together whenever we saw them. I would say, “Hello, how are you –bdaaobve-?” with my voice trailing off into nothing as I pronounced the last bit. Well, the other day, I invited him in a confident manner, “Come on in Dave.” Turns out his name is Bob.
I’ve fortunately avoided the very real danger of forgetting my wife’s name. (Note to self: Her name is Julie) I was especially frightened, at the beginning of our dating days, that I might unthinkingly call her by my ex-girlfriend’s name. (Emily) This would have been very bad. I know this because I once unthinkingly called Emily “Julie.” Emily was not particularly pleased about this. This now, however, is getting more complicated, since I have to remember my son’s name as well. (Note to self: His name is James) Perhaps my father and I could use the name tag system for just a bit?
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