Alfred had two eyes shaped like almonds. His irises where
shaped like marbles. His nose was in exactly the place a nose should be. He had
a perfectly reasonable mouth. All of it was covered in skin, just like anyone
had the right to expect.
Alfred looked up the Wikipedia definition of Face Blindness.
He was surprised to find that Oliver Sacks and Chuck Close suffered from face
blindness. He spent over 30 minutes looking at paintings by Chuck Close. Huh,
he thought. Then he went back to Wikipedia and hit the button to edit. After
the definition he wrote, “What if the problem is NOT that someone can’t
recognize faces? What if the problem is that no one recognizes my face?”
Laying in bed, unable to sleep, Alfred couldn’t remember the
last invitation he got. Sure there were the mass invites to various activities,
but he couldn’t remember the last time someone wanted to be up close with his
him. There must be something wrong with his face, so he decided to change it.
Sometimes the distance between him and other people seemed
manageable, just a matter of crossing the street. But then he saw how close
other people were, and how they would laugh and laugh, and he couldn’t help
feeling like it was still as difficult as finding a seat on the school bus. No
one would say, hey, come sit here. How could his troubles not be face-based?
He briefly considered the fact that he didn’t care much for
other people. That he wasn’t good at making time for others, and he often
preferred to be in his house reading, or some other solo activity. Finding time
for other people required a lot of work, and he wasn’t sure he was able to give
up that much real estate in his heart. But his face, that was another story.
