If I'm not careful, I may end up setting a record for number of times a person who doesn't care about Facebook includes mention of it in a single blog. Ah, well. It's not like they need the advertising.
I received a "friend request" this morning from someone whose name I didn't recognize at all. Rather than deleting the request out of hand, I opened the notification e-mail to see whether there was a note attached. There was. This person claimed to know me from not one, but two places. Apparently, we worked together for about a week three years ago, before I changed jobs. He saw me (and presumably spoke with me) shortly thereafter at the home of some (apparently) mutual friends in Brooklyn. Having absolutely no recollection of either of these events, I asked a couple of pointed questions in the effort to try to jog my memory (after having accepted his friend request, of course). It turns out that, not only did we work at the same company, but he sat directly across from my cubicle, on the other side of the wall. Nope, still no recollection. Apparently, I received a bouquet of flowers at the office that week. (Really? Someone gave me flowers?? Who????) And it would also appear that I was so happy to be leaving that particular place of employment, I "sang all week". Now, while I'm not generally in the habit of bursting into song when other people are present, it's not entirely outside the realm of possibility. There was a pretty high rate of turnover at one point; I have a dim recollection of the desk on the other side of the wall changing hands a few times. And the flowers could easily have been a nice-to-have-known-you or good-luck gift, if they weren't sent for some other reason. It's all plausible. I just don't remember any of it.
This leads me to conlude that my memory, which I've long known holds only vague impressions of past events, holds absolutely no impressions at all of others. While this would ordinarily be mildly disconcerting, the knowledge that a virtual stranger remembers things about me and my activities that I have no recollection of is downright unsettling.
Coincidentally (and this is where Facebook is disturbingly cool), I noticed that this person and I have a "Mutual Friend" in New Jersey. I asked how he knew MF, and he told me that his wife went to school with MF's wife (also a friend of mine). Really? Turns out that he and his wife attended MF's wedding. A wedding which I also attended. Did I meet this guy and the wedding, as well as at the office, as well as in Brooklyn?
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