What’s your name again?

It’s weird.

As I get older, I seem to get worse at the social thing. Well, not actually the social thing. I’m happy enough having a chat, especially over a beer. No, what I’m getting worse at is remembering names and faces.

When I was overseas recently, I was at a friend’s house where I was introduced to a number of people. The next day, we all met up again, and I didn’t recognise most of them. Nor did I remember any of their names. I blame it on being introduced to just so many people that I could never be expected to remember any of them, and yet, my Australian friend remembered them all. Lucky she was there. She saved my blushes.

Then, once again, today I was walking through ‘a praça’, the square here in Fuseta, when someone called out to me. He was an older gent. I noticed that he wore glasses and had long since lost most of his hair. I didn’t recognise him. He was with a couple of friends and came towards me with a big smile on his face, hand outstretched, ready to shake.

I took his hand, thinking to myself:

‘Who the hell is this? How does he know my name? Where does he know me from? It must be Nanobrew, mustn’t it?’

So many people pass through Nanobrew, and we often end up chatting, so yes, that must have been it – one of the many tourists who come to Fuseta. In fact, he did tell me that he loves Fuseta, that he loves coming here. So yes, that was definitely it.

I asked him how long he was here for this time, and he looked at me quizzically, a confused expression on his face.

‘But, but…’

I think it was slowly dawning on him that I had no idea who he was. How embarrassing.

He then put me back on the straight and narrow, by talking about my friend in Olhão. Something in the deep recesses of my mind clicked. A little bell went off. Bloody hell, I did know him. In my defence, we’d only met a couple of times. He was a friend of a friend, and the last time I’d seen him was a couple of years back, in Olhão. But that’s no excuse really. He’d recognised me, hadn’t he?

Still, again in my defence, I meet a lot of people, and I certainly don’t remember them all, and definitely not their names. And that’s always been the way. I don’t know what it is. It always takes me two or three meetings to remember someone’s face and then maybe more meetings to remember their name. I really am bloody useless.

Anyway, after apologising for not remembering him, I went on my way, taking a deep breath as I went, puffing out my cheeks. Blimey, that was awkward. I made a note to myself:

‘I really need to try harder. I need to make more of an effort to remember people and their names.’

And yet, to be honest, I’m really happy in my own company, in my own skin. I feel content on my own. In fact, sometimes I’m happier in my own company than I am with other people. Maybe that’s why I write, and walk and swim. Maybe I’m simply happier with my own thoughts, and not much else matters to me. There again, I have to say, I love the people in my life, I just don’t need too many of them.

I find it strange the way some people are: they seem to love being with others, seem to love being surrounded by people all the time. That’s never been my way. Maybe this is the result of both my parents being ‘only’ children (a bit of psychoanalysis here, obviously). I have no aunts, no uncles, no cousins. Now that Mum has gone, there is simply Dad and my two brothers.

Maybe that’s reflected in my inability to take in more than a few names and faces, but who knows?

Is it that I simply don’t pay attention when I meet someone? Is it that when I meet someone, I’m too busy thinking about what to say next, or make a good impression? Is it stress? Is it the fact I’m getting older? Or is it prosopagnosia, the medical term for not being able to recognise faces, alongside anomic aphasia, the medical term for not recalling names?

As I said, who bloody knows?

All I can say is: if I don’t recognise you or forget your name, please bear with me. I’m sure there’s a reason for it… and I really don’t intend to be rude.