Hi I'm Hiddenautistic. Kind of a long name. I have had two events happen lately that I need to tell someone and if I tell my husband he will get very anxious and worried about me, understandably.
First, one morning when I was babysitting a baby in her own home while the parents were on vacation, a policeman knocked on the door. He said he was responding to a security system breach.
The conversation went something like this:
P: I'm here about a security system call.
Me: Oh, I thought the family said they had their system turned off.
P: Well, the system says it was the kitchen door that triggered the alarm. Looks like you don't exactly have a kitchen door, or this front door would be it.
Me: Well, I don't think I've opened any doors this morning.
I look up at a funny camera-like thing at the top left of the front door and I remember something.
Me: Well, I do remember this thing up here was flashing red last night and I wondered about it.
P: It's 1999?
Me: (Thinking he was asking about the manufacturing date of the thing at the top of the door that flashed red) -
I really don't know.
Silence for a minute.
P: What's the address here?
Me: I don't know but I have it in my phone. Let me go get it real quick. (Looking for phone and of course can't find it right away.)
P: Miss, is the address here 1999?
Me: I can't remember. It doesn't sound familiar.
P: Oh never mind, I can see that the mailboxes are shifted to one side of the house. This call is for your neighbor's house.
I look at the mailbox for my client's house and I see their house number as plain as day: 1997.
I look at the neighbor's mailbox and it has 1999 written on it. (The Aha! Moment when I realize he wasn't making conversation about the manufacturing date of the security system.)
Me: Oh! yes that sounds right. 1997. Sorry to keep you Officer.
I am so embarrassed! It never dawned on me that he might have the wrong house. It never dawned on me that I probably would have heard an alarm if I had set off a security system. It seemed strange that it would matter what year the system was built, but hey who was I to question a police officer's detective tactics? I am so embarrassed!
I did not tell anyone the truth about this little experience. I only told the parents that the police came to their door first until we figured out that it was supposed to be next door. I didn't tell my husband at all because he worries about me being vulnerable and gullible when I answer the door, which is why I don't want to tell him the whole truth about today's encouter.
Today it's snowing and very cold outside. Around 7:45 am, after my husband had already left for work, a loud knock came on the front door. Reluctantly I opened the door, wondering what kind of trouble was about to happen. A man wearing a hooded sweatshirt, no gloves, no scarf, obviously not dressed to be outside, tells me he is my neighbor and he got locked out of his house.
I knew I had to think of some way to try to verify this, but lacking quick and clever thinking skills, I could only think of asking him where he lives. He seemed to be pointing around the corner to the house where a man and woman live who come and talk with my husband fairly frequently in summer weather. I couldn't remember his name, but I figured I would recognize it if I heard it so I asked him his name. He said Ron, and it sounded right. I then said about the cleverest thing I could think of: I asked him to take his hood off because I didn't recognize him with it on. He obliged but it didn't help.
I have face blindness and I wouldn't recognize my own husband if circumstances were just a little off. I decided since he hadn't said or done anything yet that was questionable, and since I didn't have a very, very bad feeling about him, the only polite thing I could do is to offer him refuge in the house.
He used my cell phone to call his wife at work, and long story short, after 20 minutes (that's how long we figured it would take her to drive home from work) I sent him home hoping she would show up soon to let him in the house. She did.
What's wrong with this story? Well, mostly, that I didn't contact my husband right away, while the man was still standing outside the front door. Also, that I never told my husband what was going on even though I was texting with my husband about another topic while the neighbor was sitting inside. Ron is a talkative fellow and he kept me busy listening to his conversation. That's fine with me. It's better than awkward silence. But it also keeps my mind so busy that I can't think.
I am frustrated that there seems to be no way for me to deal with face blindness, nor for me to think fast enough to deal with situations where someone shows up at the door with a need of any kind. I can't think of how to find out if someone is lying, so I just give in to what seems like my only option, which is to be polite and offer assistance if possible.
Reminds me of another situation last November where a man is at the door holding a big foil package, like some kind of food, and says it's for my husband. He smiles all friendly-like as if we know each other. I couldn't think fast enough to pretend that I know him. I just had a lost look on my face and asked something like "Who are you?" He was someone who had come over for dinner to our house only a month or so before, someone my husband works with. He was giving us some kind of food gift for the holidays. I was so embarrassed. You would think that once he told me who he was, I would somehow recognize his face, but I didn't. Not in the least. Same with the neighbor this morning. I looked at his face for almost an hour while he talked this morning and it never looked familiar to me. I'm afraid it never will.
Yours truly,
Hiddenautistic
21 Jan 2016, 9:55 am
