Another Pair of Ayes

Aye, where have I been, mates? Working, meandering, mulling, malling, and walking. That sort of thing. As for mulling, I'm a big believer in the value of having another pair of eyes to mull over one's document, especially if I am hired as that pair of eyes, naturally (since I am a gainfully self-employed editor and writer). Yesterday I encountered one of those lovely gems you can't make up, as if it came straight from one of the novels of Peter DeVries, a favorite of mine (I have a collection of his first editions). I was reviewing a document for a client who was trumpeting the virtues of certain empirical educational benefits to his client. It showed up twice in the document as "lesions learned." I thoroughly enjoyed this; fortunately, so did my client. We laughed together with a sense of shared relief. (If he were to read this, I am confident he would take no offense, since none is intended.) Alas, a computerized spellchecker did not alert either one of us to this potential embarrassment. I am glad I caught it. Granted, the eye plays tricks, and it is quite likely that the reader would have performed a visual gestalt sleight of hand, so to speak in mixed metaphors, and have read the phrase as "lessons learned," as intended. But maybe not. "Lesions learned" can now be invoked as a ringing example to other clients of the value of editorial review. I happen to believe in the old-fashioned notion that, especially with technical documents, accuracy counts for something. And if the reader were to accept an oversight such as "lesions learned," he or she would have planted a mental seed in his or her head (where else?) that would slightly doubt the veracity of more substantive issues in the rest of the document. (After all, what's a decimal place or two?) Given the right circumstances, of course, a decimal point or two means life or death, speaking of lesions. (Yes, learning can leave scars.) Maybe I should form a new social networking group, The Lesions of Honor. All a-bored!

Saving Face

Did you know some people find it difficult to remember or identify faces? It's called prosopagnosia, or "face blindness." Here's a simple test you can take to see if you have it. (Hint: you have to guess whether it's Bush or Blair. Yuck! Why not Jennifer Lopez vs. Salma Hayek? Or Brad Pitt vs. George Clooney? Whatever.)

Not having one's face recognized is especially onerous in the Age of Celebrity. Imagine how slighted the glitterati feel.

It turns out authors are frequently among the unrecognized faces. But I'm alert to such sightings, probably because they are what I am not. Years ago I worked at Random House in New York. I saw Joseph Heller on the elevator. I approached John Updike in the lobby, asked for his autograph, and he chatted with me amiably. Kurt Vonnegut was often seen in the neighborhood. I saw Norman Mailer strutting up Second Avenue. (Before all that, I even met the satirist Peter DeVries at his house.) I saw James Baldwin sitting alone in a hotel lobby in Chicago in the 1980s, shook his hand (somewhat cold and feeble), and asked for his autograph. He pleasantly obliged, and his face warmed with a smile seemingly at the fact someone recognized his face.

(As you can see, I am a shameless name-dropper. Is it a sign of poor self-esteem? Or just living vicariously?)

I shouldn't joke about this face blindness phenomenon; it is considered a real neurological impairment. It's not that I think I have it, but I do find it difficult to describe a face to someone. It's hard for me to draw that picture with words. And I have no talent as a visual artist beyond the creation of stick figures.

I remember the youthful thrill of trying to rivet into my brain the image of the visage of someone I liked. (Typically, of course, I was unable to articulate such affection.) Must be what Lennon and McCartney had in mind with "I've Just Seen a Face."

Then there are the images of those I feared or loathed: a kid who bullied me, a teacher who smacked me to the ground. I wish I had no memory of their faces. Prosopagnosia for the antagonisti, call it.

Whether visually or otherwise, we seek to save face. In domestic quarrels, each participant tries to save face.

Barry Bonds held out on signing a $15.8 million contract with the San Francisco Giants, just to save face.

Nations and sects and rivals also fight to save face, even if it means destroying the whole body, the whole body politic, the whole soul, in the process.

I wonder if there is such a thing as mammogagnosia, "the forgetting of breasts"? I think I'm afflicted with whatever the opposite of that is. And let me tell you, Braille may not help but who cares!

There's even a romantic comedy film called Saving Face by Alice Wu. It concerns a Chinese-American lesbian.

Maybe right about now, some of you are wishing I'd do an about face (which is also the title of a work by Dario Fo, but not by Dario Marquez)!

Does all this make me a facist? (Read that last word carefully. Remember, spelling counts.)