Catch me if you can

Playing the party game with your mental rolodex

So we are at this swank party and enjoying the ambience when a guy thumps me on the back and says, my goodness it is you, fancy meeting you here, long time no see, where have you been hiding? I am blank, no clue as I desperately riffle through my mental rolodex. Now, it would be so much more sensible to say sorry, can’t quite place you but no, we have to play the social game and pretend and lie through our teeth as we Sherlock our way through a forest of social niceties.

So, I open the bid with good to see you too, how are you these days, that being par for the course. Mostly in Cape Town, he says, you still living here, how long has it been, over twenty years since we last met. I nod, now searching for some other spotlight, some glimmer of recognition but the turn of the century, now that is a clue. “And how’s work, doing well?” Not bad…and you? “Pretty good, a million here, a million there, you know how it is in my business.”

Actually, I don’t, so I say, tough times, still blankety blank about who he is and nothing further coming on his business. You are looking good, he says, you have kept fit. Not so bad yourself, I respond, you look just the same. All this feeling around brings us to a momentary silence then I say, staying in town long? He says, a week at least, then off to Japan. 

In a bid to make up for the guilt of not being able to place him I dive deeper into the darkness and say then we must get together. Catch up with old times, he says, will be fun, you in touch with any of the old gang? Good lord, did we belong to the same gang? Where was this gang? I am in touch with Ravi, he says. Now I am wrestling with which Ravi. Everyone knows a Ravi or two.

Half a dozen clichés tumble out from both sides about stuff like great to catch up, let’s not wait this long for the next round, recall the good times, let’s make it soon. Then he says, by the way, what’s your name? I raise my eyes in surprise. You don’t know my name? He says nope, as a matter of fact I don’t know you either, we haven’t ever met, I just do this for fun, adds zip to the evening, everyone falls for it. No one has ever called me on it, isn’t that incredible, it is a riot watching folks struggling to place a stranger. Then he puts out his hand and introduces himself.