Apathy, the Sweet, Sweet Drug that Blurs Each Day into the Next

I've come to realize one of the benefits of always being in an unfamiliar social circumstances is such a sweet delight and that is ignorance. When you are introduced to someone new it's great because you have a fresh slate and you can come up with witty remarks and have a grand time. And if you're always doing this, then many different people will believe that you are a funny guy. However, there is distinct disadvantage to this always happening to me because I do not bother to remember any conversation from before five minutes ago.

I think I have that same condition as the guy in Memento. I have no long term memory or something. And it is always comes back to haunt me when there's a guy who comes up to me and says, "Hey Dave! Cracker barrels and snot junebugs!" And then I just stare at the guy and have no idea what he's talking about. And then it will turn out that I apparently said that same phrase 4 and half years ago and it was the greatest said by a human barring most teachings in the Bible and this individual had remembered. They have gone one to write inspirational devotionals based on this hilarious phrased I coined and have long since forgotten and when presented out of context (or at least by the person I'm talking to) it turns out to not be funny to me anymore. Of course, the person will be hurt that I have forgotten this special connection that we shared so long ago and it was a source of strength to them in a time of self-loathing and doubt and since I have abandoned my soul (or more accurately memory) I clearly don't care about this person anymore because of some dumb saying.

Or there are the people that merely say my old phrases to me that I made up in hopes that I will forget that I said it and pass it off as a joke and then get that idiotic look on their face waiting for me to keel over in convulsing laughter and then I have to do one of those forced laughs that subtley expresses my suppressed anger.

Mind you, the humour aspect of this short term memory problem is not the worst part. It is a lot worse when someone tells me something of extreme importance or seriousness and then two weeks later they are talking about the same problem but I'm all lost because it seems to me like this is the first time I've heard this problem. I have to fake my way through the conversation and hope that they will actually state the problem again so that it will catch me up to speed. The sad part is that I can't even begin to guess what the issue was.

For instance, I remember (based off an awkward conversation that told place later) my youth pastor telling me about a deeply personal event in his life and I assume he was relating it to mine somehow. Later on he referenced to this event later by saying something like "This is exactly what happened to me and you need to be careful." And I didn't have any idea what he was talking about and he was rather unimpressed that I forgot a major personal event in his life. He said, "What? Weren't you paying attention that day when I had the hardest time telling everybody that story?" And I kind of paused trying to come up with something to reassure him. I took a breath and said, "You already told me this? I guess I flat out missed that memo." Some would say that made it worse. And I think it did. But I wasn't really paying attention because I have forgotten. And the thing is I can't ask him anymore to tell what it was. So I actually will never find that out again. I think it might be garish of me to ask that now.

Fortunately for me, I have been able to better handle such scenarios since and I know many people have told me very intimate details of their life and I have kept those secrets well in my vault. Well, it's more like I lost the combination to the vault. Either way, those individuals feel close to me and I always will wonder why. Maybe its simply because they know I can keep a secret. Or at least forget about it. And that's someone you can trust. Unless the secret is like something to do about remembering to do something. That wouldn't be as good.

But why do I forget these details about my close friends? I've done some deep soul searching in the last two sentences and I think it's something deep inside me called apathy, the sweet, sweet drug that blurs each day into the next and allows me to idle in the drudgery of my existence and waste the faintly glimmering hope cruelly placed there by sincere individuals trying to encourage me. In other words, I really don't care about my friends, making me a grade A bastard.