I got a voicemail at work from a man at a state entity who was following up on an e-mail I had sent in November of 2024. Yes, he was working on a request I had made a year and a half ago. I couldn't even find the e-mail in my outlook folders to know what case the request might have been relevant to. I didn't even know what last name I would have used on that e-mail as that was the month everything transitioned over. Did the contact info he had of me have my married name or my current name?
When I called him at the number he left in the voicemail, a woman answered the phone. She indicated I had called his wife's phone and wanted to know what this was regarding. I have to admit I was really puzzled and stumbled when I explained I was returning his call in his role at [state entity]. I told her I would try the number on the caller ID. After I hung up, I couldn't recall if I had actually identified myself or if I had left her wondering why some strange woman was calling for her husband.
Then this evening as I was leaving my apartment complex to go to my first African Rhythms dance class, I passed by my maintenance man sitting on a bench talking to another maintenance man. The other man greeted me first and asked if I had previously lived at a certain apartment complex. I admitted I had. He then went on to confirm that I was on the fifth floor in a corner unit.
As he was asking me these questions, I was trying to recall who the maintenance staff had been. I couldn't. I probably blocked them out of my mind because maintenance issues (although with a neglectful management and a rotating door of property managers) had been the reason we had left. I commented that was quite a few years ago. He recalled it was as recent as 2023. I agreed that was when we left.
He then asked about my husband. I think this is the first time I've faced this question. The circle of people who knew us together is quite small and they mostly all saw the divorce happen. So I haven't really, until this point, run into anyone who both knew I had been married and didn't already know we had divorced.
I paused only a moment before I said, "my ex-husband." I then turned to my regular maintenance man and said "and I hope he has finally moved out." My regular maintenance man said, "I think he has."
I kind of laughed as I walked through the park to my class. It was such an unexpected encounter with someone who remembered me so well but who I could not recall.
And then after I checked in for my class and sat down on a bench to wait for it to start, a woman sat next to me and told me that I looked really familiar. She couldn't place where she might know me from and I didn't recognize her. I don't know if she is someone I should remember or if my face just reminds her of someone else.
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