I'm not sure why I even remembered this, probably because earlier today I once again stuck a Benedict vid in a post and then thought Good grief, I've overused this guy so much I've probably got readers sick to death of him always being my token post face now, and then got busy and forgot all about it until I took a break a little bit ago, and then it floated back up.
Several years ago, @bonenado was trying to point someone out to me without being terribly obvious, forget where we were, but he doesn't describe well and can't line of sight from another point of view to save his life, so after me asking if it was this person wearing whatever or that tall person or redhead and on and on, he got frustrated and fussed about how difficult I am and I fussed back, "I can't help it, white people all look the same to me!" And of course we had a good laugh because I can honestly say that without being racist at all, and it's funny because I'm Caucasian. I've mentioned a few times in blogs that I'm more comfortable with chickens because I can tell two identical white hens apart just fine, but I can't tell two people apart even when they look very different. Just this week on twitter I was corrected when I misidentified Hulk Hogan as Jesse Ventura. Hey, I saw the outfit and Americana motif and thought I nailed it. Now imagine me handling regular customers in a sales job. I'm really good at smooth apologizing.
It never dawns on me what other people see. My uncle let me try on his glasses when I was a preteen and explained to me he needed them because faces were a blur without them. I couldn't understand why that would make a difference. I didn't see blurry faces, but being able to see them never helped me tag who was who anyway unless I also had other variables to plug in alongside what I was seeing, like voice or behavior or silhouette or even just what I'd seen someone wearing before. So when I post Ben vids, I quickly forget.
It has always bored me silly to look through photo albums, and for a long time even I wondered what was wrong with me, if I really don't care or something, because everyone else seems so interested in pictures. Lots and lots of pictures. Can you imagine a world where pictures of people's faces are so pixelated that you can't tell just by glancing who is whom? I don't see pixelated faces, but once I've looked away, they may as well be because the memory fogs out in my mind and I have to work very hard to remember what someone looked like. Some faces become iconic, of course, having seen them so many times, but I'm still struggling with most people's faces both in real life and in entertainment.
Every time I see Benedict Cumberbatch, he's a new person to me. I can put side by side pics of him from different movies and interviews and swear that's not the same person. I don't get tired of someone who is able to keep my interest otherwise, and he's pretty great at stuff like enunciating clearly quickly enough to keep a brain actually working. I have a really hard time not being bored out of my skull sitting around just listening to people. What's funny is if I can hear someone talking in the background, I can't tune it out, I hear every single word, like a tape recorder. If I hear two convos at once, I'm screwed, there is no way I can process one out. If I go out of my way to listen to you, you're special.
If I remember your face, it's probably because somewhere in my head, I have meme-locked you into place somehow. Apparently, I'm not alone, but I'll try to give Ben a break. He's doing all this free work hanging out on my blog for months, I probably owe this man a pair of sox.
