I Knew You Before I Didn't

I’m going to take a wild guess that this has happened to you before. Not only that, I don’t think I’m going out on a limb if I suggest you’ve done this before yourself. Most of us have. Here’s the situation: I gave a speech at a Rotary function. As will happen in local business meetings, I met a guy I knew by sight as the manager of the local supermarket. We had a brief and amiable chat.
After having been introduced to each other, when I saw him in the store we would shake hands and exchange pleasantries. We did that for a few weeks. Then we simply waved when we spotted each other. Gradually we only made eye contact as a way of acknowledging each other. Of course the final step was to ignore each other, acting as if we had never met.
What’s up with that? It wasn’t his fault and it certainly wasn’t mine. We just did it. Or should I say didn’t? Now when I see him I can’t help but wonder if he decided I wasn’t someone he needed to know now or for future reference. In other words maybe he decided I wasn’t important enough or interesting enough to even say hello. Of course that’s a two way street. He might be wondering the same thing about me.
Admit it. You’ve had that experience. After having been known you were gradually relegated to stranger status. Why do human beings behave like that? How could a simple hello become such a burden? Certainly we’ve all met someone that we’ve had to expel from our roster of casual acquaintances because they wanted the peripheral role they were playing in your life to be a lead role. When they wouldn’t take the hint that they were extras in your play, you had to blow them off.
Such a person can indeed be a pain. But the situation I’m describing is one where you haven’t even auditioned for a major part. You’re happy being an extra. But even that’s too much for some people. They ease you out moving from good morning and a warm handshake to pretending they don’t see you, even crossing the street to avoid having to say hello.
I liked knowing the supermarket manager. If there was ever a problem with the fresh peaches or a broken jar of spaghetti sauce, I could tell him, as a friend of course, that he had a cleanup to handle in aisle five. Not that I ever got that far. I wonder if he suspected I might be the presumptuous type. That a gentle complaint about too ripe bananas would morph into a full blown recommendation about how to organize the fresh seafood case.
That never would have happened by the way. I am a firm believer that unless you’re in the same line of work, there is very little you can add to someone else’s work. When someone has invested years to learn their business we should respect their knowledge. Still, maybe I lingered too long near the bakery or squeezed one too many loaves of bread to suit him.
Sometimes when I see this guy I wonder if he thought my speech was lousy. Is that why he put me in the deep freeze? I’m wracking my brain to remember my topic that day. I know for sure it had nothing to do with the grocery business so I am safe on that score.
The other possibility is that having met me he just decided he didn’t like me. Nothing personal you understand. Perhaps, I’m just not his cup of tea. If that’s the case, he is absolutely wrong about me. If I wasn’t a nice guy I would be including his first and last name in this story not to mention the name of his supermarket and its location.
I’m not sure we consciously decide to delete people. I suspect sometimes it just happens. If pressed to explain it we probably couldn’t come up with a good reason in most cases. But I think we wind up feeling just a little bit uncomfortable every time we bump into a former acquaintance. Pretending you don’t know someone is hard work. Maybe the answer is to start over. Walk up to that person and say hello. I think I’ll do just that with the supermarket manager. Probably we’ll both be relieved. And I’ll never ask him why the self service cash registers are programmed to say stupid things like, “don’t forget to take you’re receipt.”

Copyright 2008 Len Serafino. All rights reserved.