very strange

So a strange thing happened to me the other day...

I was at my weekly dance lesson. Yes, hubs and I take dancing lessons and absolutely love them! Anyway...We were just about to leave when I heard, "Hey Ms. T!". Turning around I saw a young gentleman who looked somewhat familiar. Obviously he was a former student as very rarely do I get called Ms. for any other reason. My head quickly went into archive mode.

Contrary to popular belief, I do not remember every single one of my students. Far from it. In fact, although I do very well at remembering their names by the first day, if I see them in the halls in a semester in which I do not teach them, I can't remember their names for the life of me.

So I'm hunting in my brain for who on earth this student could possibly be and the only person who comes to mind was this little shit that I taught about 5 years ago named C. My only thoughts were, "there's no way he would say hi, he hated me as much as I hated him." To top it off, being completely out of context in the dance studio was really not fair.

So I did the generic, "Hey, how's it going" To which he replied, "Not well". (Who does that??) So, I felt obligated to ask then, what the problem was. He diverted. So now I look even more like an ass. His instructor then jumped in and said, "Oh, you two know each other?" I was stammering when he answered, "yes, Ms. T taught me summer school a while back".

OK...I taught 2 semesters of summer school 4 and 5 years ago. These are kids from all over the city (so no frame of reference) and I only see them for 4 weeks. 4 weeks out of my teaching career!! I still felt bad, but at least I understood why I had no recollection of who this guy was.

After a very awkward few minutes in which he really looked liked he wanted to say something and me just really wanting to escape, I finally did. I think he was looking for recognition. I should've just said, "I'm sorry, I have no idea who you are". But I was so frazzled that I tried my hardest to play the game and ended up just looking like an idiot.

After he left, I asked my instructor who this person was. She laughed at me because she felt that we had such a connection (seemingly from him) that she was sure I knew who he was. She told me his name was G - boy was I ever happy I didn't say, "Oh, Hi C. How are things!"

I have to say though, I still really don't remember the G person. Oh well.

I really need a better way of dealing with this type of situation.