My turn: Remembering names not my game

I’m pathetically bad at remembering people’s names, but many people are just as bad at remembering mine.

I have an idea who most people are; the problem is putting names to faces. But when people see my face, they tend to want to give me different names.

They’ll say, “I know you. You’re one of those Rodriguez girls. You’re the one who works at Super Save?”

I shake my head no.

“You cut hair?”

I shake my head no again.

“You work at Head Start?”

No again.

Finally, “Oh yeah, you’re the one who writes for the newspaper.”

Bingo.

They have my name, and then they’ll say, “Tell your mom and dad I said hi,” and I’m walking away trying to figure out who the person is and not wanting to be rude by asking them.

And when I get home, I’m like, “Somebody at Wal-Mart said to tell you hi, but I’m not sure who. I think one of your cousins.” I then describe the person and, oftentimes, mom can figure out who it is.

According to researchers, our brain has to be exposed to something 15 times before we remember. Some of these people I run into once a year. Maybe in 15 years I will have their names down.