The World's Common Tater

Updating this one because lately I have found myself at the same place as some people from my old church on a regular basis. They have all walked right past me with no indication that they know who I am. I guess my impact there was a lot less than I thought and you can tell from the third paragraph below I already knew it was low. I assume when I find a new job I will quickly be forgotten at work as well.

Before any of my coworkers or fellow Marylanders start to celebrate you can cancel the party plans – you are stuck with me for a while. I know most of you are now too depressed to read the rest of the post, but I will continue to write anyway.

I’ve written a little about this before(Lost Connections). I started thinking about it again when I received an email from the place I worked for 19 years. They emailed asking for information. I gave them the information and also told them I was in a new job. I received a one word email back(thanks) with no acknowledgment of the news of the new job. I’ve also never been invited back since I left. While I was there, they traditionally invited former coworkers back for holiday lunches and special events. I have never been invited back and only hear from them when they need something. I’m not really that bothered by it. I just wonder sometimes why I seem so easily forgotten.

I once attended a church for about 14 years. I was a deacon, a Sunday school teacher, a youth leader and served on various committees. I spent much of my life at the church and on youth trips. There came a time when it became obvious that it was no longer the right fit for my family so we started looking for a new place to worship. It took a while, but we have found a new church home. When we stopped attending the old church no one ever contacted us about it. I did tell the youth pastor that we had made the decision to leave, so that might be why there was no outreach but I still wonder after all the time I put in at the church how we could leave with no contact at all. No call or visit from anyone associated with the church at all to even ask why we felt the need to leave. Several months later, I received an email from the church. It was not an email checking on us. It was obvious from the content that the sender didn’t realize we had stopped attending. It was a big church, but I didn’t think it was that big. Again, a situation that makes me wonder why I am so forgettable or if the 14 years at the church really had so little impact that no one missed me when I was gone.

I moved to a new branch almost 6 months ago(I’m sure it feels much longer to my new coworkers). I wonder if the old branch already seems like I was never there. I was just some random, replaceable guy who used to work there.  I’m 8 years away from removing myself completely from the collective memory of the library world. I can live my life as an old hermit writing sad blog posts that no one will read. I’m OK with that.