My diagnosis is called prosopagnosia. It’s hard to pronounce the word. And, most likely, you haven’t heard about it before. But, according to the statistics, every 50th person suffers from this ailment. Prosopagnosia is a facial recognition disorder. That is, the patient clearly distinguishes forms and colors, even the faces of animals. But not people’s faces.
I don’t even know what my parents look like. And if I see them in a group of people, I’ll hardly recognize them. But still, most often, I can distinguish them by their clothes, gait and voices.
Anyway, no one knew about my illness until some celebration in my kindergarten. We were told to give the flowers to our moms. I was 5 then. I looked at a group of women and didn’t understand which of them was my mum.
It’s hard for a common person to understand how one can’t distinguish faces with good eyesight. I think each of you saw twins at least once. Now, imagine they are everywhere. And every person looks just like these twins.
So, you, your family and your friends look in the mirror the same. Now, do you understand what I'm talking about?
As you know, I can’t fall in love with a beautiful girl, because for me, they’re all the same. But I like brunettes with a gentle voice, who are fond of rock-n-roll like me.
By the way, now, I described my girlfriend. She’s just like this. Her name’s Sandra. When I came to our first date, I gave a bouquet of flowers to an unknown woman who wasn’t far from her by mistake.
Sandra cried and ran away. And the woman was shocked by what was happening. Later, I explained everything to Sandra. We laughed together, and she said she was really happy I didn’t evaluate her by her looks. She doesn’t have to doubt I have true feelings for her.
My biggest fear is being in public places. For example, in the classroom, I spend most of the time only on identifying my classmates.
I remember who sits where. But during the breaks, it becomes a nightmare. Who talks to me? Whom do I say hello to? Who just passed by? Oh, how fed up with this I am!
And in our school, we have a really strict principal. At the sight of him, everyone freezes. But I can’t always identify him by his clothes. So, my behavior doesn’t change when I see him. Once, I came up to him in the hall and asked him if he needed help. Because it seemed to me it was someone's parent who got lost. Everyone laughed, even the principal himself. But I didn’t understand what at.
Those who are new to me often think I’m arrogant because I don’t say hello to them and pretend I don’t know this person. Look, my friend. I really don’t know who you are. Because for me, you look just like everyone else!
Once, my friends invited me to a music festival. I was a little dizzy from loud music, so I moved to a quiet place, away from everyone. And I sat on the curb. After a while, one guy came up to me, and we got into the conversation.
When I named my favorite music artist, he hesitated and asked if I had seen his video clips. Or if I had been to his concerts. “Of course,” I said. And I even grinned when he asked this.
My new friend apologized and said with hesitation he needed to go. At that moment, my friends came up to us. And they started taking selfies with that guy. Then, I realized it was the very idol I spoke about in the third person.
It was just a failure! Good that my friends explained to him what prosopagnosia was. Because he was sure he was talking to a mentally ill person. Really, every teenager in our country knew his face... well, except for me.
By the way, after that incident, we started communicating. He said I was an unusual person who had problems with visual perception. But I had a great ear. Now, he sometimes consults me before releasing a new track.
And recently, I was invited to be the jury at a music contest. The organizers say that, even though I don’t have any special awards or titles, I can evaluate the participants fairly. I won’t overestimate that stunning blonde or that girl with blue eyes. Because for me, they look exactly the same, like the dozens of other singers.
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