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My problems with identification began at an early age, and as far back as I can remember I did not identify myself with my own name. At roll call in elementary school I sometimes refused to acknowledge my presence by answering “Here” or raising my hand. The activities of my childhood friends held no interest for me and I did not feel connected to their conversations. Who were they and what did they see when they looked at me?  In college I could not identify a major and could as well have selected my curriculum at random. I somehow gathered enough credits to graduate, but after I left school I had little or no sense that I’d ever been there.

A temp agency seemed best for employment. I was assigned to one office job after another, and when I returned to an office where I’d worked before they seldom remembered who I was. While I was working at one job the agency called and asked to speak with me, and though I was seated at a desk nearby they had trouble locating me. “He’s that odd fellow there,” a man in a tie said and pointed in my direction, causing heads to turn. Rather than draw further attention to the comment I let it pass, but the sound of the word “odd” stayed in my mind. I concluded that the best way of eluding identification with the label was to leave the temporary job and the agency that had sent me to it. I had accumulated some savings so I made the decision to go without employment for a while.

I resigned myself to a goal of invisibility, and for a time all connection with the word “odd” seemed to evaporate. But slowly I began to notice the lingering stares of people who sometimes passed me in the hallway or on the stairs in the building where I lived. What questions were behind their stares?  Did they wonder what I did for money?  What, I asked myself, did I have to do with them?  I soon understood that these questions bounced back on me, leading to further mental questioning that was hard to stop. I resented being provoked by their stares and avoided eye contact with them, but avoiding their eyes only made them stare harder.

One day a man who was going up the stairway stopped me on my way down and extended his hand and told me his name. I shook his hand, having little choice in the matter, and told him the name I went by, though I must have betrayed a lack of conviction in saying it because I could see questions stirring inside his face. He explained that he had been retired for a few years and named his former occupation. He expected some similar disclosure from me, but I had no particular occupation to tell him about so I gave him a faint wave and continued down the stairs, fearing that some variation of this encounter would be repeated the next time our paths crossed. He might even tell others of his failed effort to have a conversation with me, which could lead them to think of me as odd.  A week later he passed me on the stairway again; on this occasion as he was going down.  I sensed unasked questions forming in his mind, but to my surprise he simply nodded and looked at me as if he hoped I would speak. I nodded back and kept moving toward my door, not wanting to hear his questions or even to imagine them. “Can I do anything for you?” I heard him say behind me. I did not turn, but shook my head. “He’s an odd fellow,” I told myself he was thinking about me.

That night I gave the matter some thought and decided that I might as well preserve the remainder of my savings and resume my working life. I contacted another temp agency and quickly found employment, and my new job went on comfortably without direction until one morning a coworker approached my desk. She stopped in front of me as I was filing and did not move or speak.  I looked up, and she stared straight into my eyes. What did she see?  What was I to her?  An odd fellow, a curiosity?  I didn’t want to look back at her closely enough to reveal a desire to read her. I didn’t want to ask her to move along, not knowing if she was in a position of authority or connected with someone in a position to force me to explain whatever I would have remarked to her. When she walked away, I did not let my eyes follow her.

Later, as I was leaving work, she rushed into the elevator and stood next to me, slightly closer than most people would have. She looked up at the numbers that showed we were nearing the ground floor, and when the doors opened she walked out without a word or a glance.  I took one step forward and pressed the door-open button and waited a moment, then peeked through the open door to make sure she wasn’t waiting for me. Seeing no sign of her, I stepped out of the elevator and, short of breath suddenly, sat on a bench between two elevator doors opposite me.

“I needed that,” I said to myself and wondered what meaning was held in the words. Did I mean that I needed to sit and recuperate?  Tomorrow, would she again catapult herself in front of me as I worked? 

I got almost no sleep that night and made every effort not to imagine her standing at my desk. The next day I sorted files and tried not to think ahead to the moment when she might arrive. All that day she did not appear, and toward the end I looked up occasionally to see if she might be coming toward me. The following morning she did make an appearance, and I glanced at her as she walked up. She stayed at my desk for a minute or two, and when she left I watched her first few steps away, after which my attention appeared to return to my work. It seemed unlikely to me that her visits had anything to do with our jobs, nor did I sense the beatific air of a person with a religious mission. Something else was going on, but I tried not to imagine what.

Leaving the office that day I kept my head down and listened for footsteps and headed straight for the elevator with no interruption for the restroom or the water fountain. I pressed the button for the elevator, and it opened at once.  I hopped on, but before the door closed she shot through the gap and came to rest at my side.

“That was close,” she said, not looking at me, and again she stood slightly closer than normal.  

I didn’t step away, reluctant to draw attention to my consciousness of how near she stood. The elevator stopped on the ground floor, and she stepped off and stood just outside the open door but did not turn to face me.

I had no choice but to exit the elevator. The only other choice would have been to let the door slide closed and ride it back up and back down again. I didn’t want to look ridiculous, to make a fool of myself by avoiding her in this way. Such an exhibition would have contradicted every effort I’d ever made to avoid causing ripples with my presence. I walked out of the elevator toward her.

Turning halfway around, she said: “May I help you to the bench this time?” 

So she had seen my crash landing two days before. Had I said “I needed that” out loud?  I didn’t think so, but I feared she could somehow guess I’d said it, an idea that at once seemed thoroughly ridiculous to me, and it made me angry that the thought had crossed my mind. My throat started to close, and I coughed and coughed again.

She took my arm and ushered me to the bench. I sat down with an embarrassing thud, and she sat to my left, her eyes all over me. A tissue she produced was patting my damp brow, and I wondered what might happen next. Perhaps a name exchange would be expected.  What in the hell did people see in name exchanges?  What did a name tell you about anybody? 

“Is this enough for one day?” she asked.

I did not speak, but nodded, and she got to her feet and left. I took some time to catch my breath and then stood and made my way back, thinking it would only be a short time before I’d be expected to hear her name and tell her mine.

I went to bed early but couldn’t sleep, and I rolled over and over. As far as I was concerned my name had nothing to do with me, and even to say it seemed to imply some kind of deception.  I asked myself what she saw when she looked at me and what had provoked her to try to make contact.   

In the morning I dragged myself to the office, groggy and weak, and thought about her as I waited for her to arrive. Who was she?  How could I possibly know what to make of her? 

After a couple of hours I saw her approach, and just as before, she stood at my desk. I was weary of facing her silence.

“Time for a break?” I asked her, not knowing beforehand I would say it.

I looked up at her, but not at her eyes, just below her eyes and then to one side of her eyes and then the other. She gave me one short nod.

We headed to the break room, not exchanging names, not speaking, she walking to my right and half a step behind me. The break room was unoccupied, and we sat opposite each other at a table. I tilted my head back and closed my eyes. What could I be to her?  What sort of object?  What sort of subject?  What could she be thinking she was to me? 

I looked at her, letting her face into mine. Someone was there in her eyes, and she looked at me as if she were looking at someone.

“Who,” I said to the someone I saw, not knowing what I meant or what form of absorption the word would make into her or what reply could be possible. Her mouth moved, connected to her eyes in a way I did not know the meaning of, her mouth and eyes connected to my mouth and eyes in what I suspected was the same unknown way. I resisted the urge to look away and held her gaze as she said, “Who.”

My problems with identification began at an early age, and as far back as I can remember I did not identify myself with my own name. At roll call in elementary school I sometimes refused to acknowledge my presence by answering “Here” or raising my hand. The activities of my childhood friends held no interest for me and I did not feel connected to their conversations. Who were they and what did they see when they looked at me? In college I could not identify a major and could as well have selected my curriculum at random. I somehow gathered enough credits to graduate, but after I left school I had little or no sense that I'd ever been there.

A temp agency seemed best for employment. I was assigned to one office job after another, and when I returned to an office where I'd worked before they seldom remembered who I was. While I was working at one job the agency called and asked to speak with me, and though I was seated at a desk nearby they had trouble locating me. “He's that odd fellow there,” a man in a tie said and pointed in my direction, causing heads to turn. Rather than draw further attention to the comment I let it pass, but the sound of the word “odd” stayed in my mind. I concluded that the best way of eluding identification with the label was to leave the temporary job and the agency that had sent me to it. I had accumulated some savings so I made the decision to go without employment for a while.

I resigned myself to a goal of invisibility, and for a time all connection with the word “odd” seemed to evaporate. But slowly I began to notice the lingering stares of people who sometimes passed me in the hallway or on the stairs in the building where I lived. What questions were behind their stares? Did they wonder what I did for money? What, I asked myself, did I have to do with them? I soon understood that these questions bounced back on me, leading to further mental questioning that was hard to stop. I resented being provoked by their stares and avoided eye contact with them, but avoiding their eyes only made them stare harder.

One day a man who was going up the stairway stopped me on my way down and extended his hand and told me his name. I shook his hand, having little choice in the matter, and told him the name I went by, though I must have betrayed a lack of conviction in saying it because I could see questions stirring inside his face. He explained that he had been retired for a few years and named his former occupation. He expected some similar disclosure from me, but I had no particular occupation to tell him about so I gave him a faint wave and continued down the stairs, fearing that some variation of this encounter would be repeated the next time our paths crossed. He might even tell others of his failed effort to have a conversation with me, which could lead them to think of me as odd.  A week later he passed me on the stairway again, on this occasion as he was going down.  I sensed unasked questions forming in his mind, but to my surprise he simply nodded and looked at me as if he hoped I would speak. I nodded back and kept moving toward my door, not wanting to hear his questions or even to imagine them. “Can I do anything for you?” I heard him say behind me. I did not turn, but shook my head. “He's an odd fellow,” I told myself he was thinking about me.

That night I gave the matter some thought and decided that I might as well preserve the remainder of my savings and resume my working life. I contacted another temp agency and quickly found employment, and my new job went on comfortably without direction until one morning a coworker approached my desk. She stopped in front of me as I was filing and did not move or speak.  I looked up, and she stared straight into my eyes. What did she see? What was I to her? An odd fellow, a curiosity?  I didn't want to look back at her closely enough to reveal a desire to read her. I didn't want to ask her to move along, not knowing if she was in a position of authority or connected with someone in a position to force me to explain whatever I would have remarked to her. When she walked away, I did not let my eyes follow her.

Later, as I was leaving work, she rushed into the elevator and stood next to me, slightly closer than most people would have. She looked up at the numbers that showed we were nearing the ground floor, and when the doors opened she walked out without a word or a glance.  I took one step forward and pressed the door-open button and waited a moment, then peeked through the open door to make sure she wasn't waiting for me. Seeing no sign of her, I stepped out of the elevator and, short of breath suddenly, sat on a bench between two elevator doors opposite me.

“I needed that,” I said to myself and wondered what meaning was held in the words. Did I mean that I needed to sit and recuperate? Tomorrow, would she again catapult herself in front of me as I worked?

I got almost no sleep that night and made every effort not to imagine her standing at my desk. The next day I sorted files and tried not to think ahead to the moment when she might arrive. All that day she did not appear, and toward the end I looked up occasionally to see if she might be coming toward me. The following morning she did make an appearance, and I glanced at her as she walked up. She stayed at my desk for a minute or two, and when she left I watched her first few steps away, after which my attention appeared to return to my work. It seemed unlikely to me that her visits had anything to do with our jobs, nor did I sense the beatific air of a person with a religious mission. Something else was going on, but I tried not to imagine what.

Leaving the office that day I kept my head down and listened for footsteps and headed straight for the elevator with no interruption for the restroom or the water fountain. I pressed the button for the elevator, and it opened at once.  I hopped on, but before the door closed she shot through the gap and came to rest at my side.

“That was close,” she said, not looking at me, and again she stood slightly closer than normal.

I didn't step away, reluctant to draw attention to my consciousness of how near she stood. The elevator stopped on the ground floor, and she stepped off and stood just outside the open door but did not turn to face me.

I had no choice but to exit the elevator. The only other choice would have been to let the door slide closed and ride it back up and back down again. I didn't want to look ridiculous, to make a fool of myself by avoiding her in this way. Such an exhibition would have contradicted every effort I'd ever made to avoid causing ripples with my presence. I walked out of the elevator toward her.

Turning halfway around, she said: “May I help you to the bench this time?”

So she had seen my crash landing two days before. Had I said “I needed that” out loud? I didn't think so, but I feared she could somehow guess I'd said it, an idea that at once seemed thoroughly ridiculous to me, and it made me angry that the thought had crossed my mind. My throat started to close, and I coughed and coughed again.

She took my arm and ushered me to the bench. I sat down with an embarrassing thud, and she sat to my left, her eyes all over me. A tissue she produced was patting my damp brow, and I wondered what might happen next. Perhaps a name exchange would be expected.  What in the hell did people see in name exchanges? What did a name tell you about anybody?

“Is this enough for one day?” she asked.

I did not speak, but nodded, and she got to her feet and left. I took some time to catch my breath and then stood and made my way back, thinking it would only be a short time before I'd be expected to hear her name and tell her mine.

I went to bed early but couldn't sleep, and I rolled over and over. As far as I was concerned my name had nothing to do with me, and even to say it seemed to imply some kind of deception.  I asked myself what she saw when she looked at me and what had provoked her to try to make contact.

In the morning I dragged myself to the office, groggy and weak, and thought about her as I waited for her to arrive. Who was she? How could I possibly know what to make of her?

After a couple of hours I saw her approach, and just as before, she stood at my desk. I was weary of facing her silence.

“Time for a break?” I asked her, not knowing beforehand I would say it.

I looked up at her, but not at her eyes, just below her eyes and then to one side of her eyes and then the other. She gave me one short nod.

We headed to the break room, not exchanging names, not speaking, she walking to my right and half a step behind me. The break room was unoccupied, and we sat opposite each other at a table. I tilted my head back and closed my eyes. What could I be to her? What sort of object? What sort of subject? What could she be thinking she was to me?

I looked at her, letting her face into mine. Someone was there in her eyes, and she looked at me as if she were looking at someone. “Who,” I said to the someone I saw, not knowing what I meant or what form of absorption the word would make into her or what reply could be possible. Her mouth moved, connected to her eyes in a way I did not know the meaning of, her mouth and eyes connected to my mouth and eyes in what I suspected was the same unknown way. I resisted the urge to look away and held her gaze as she said, “Who.”

© 2010 Glen Pourciau