Nobody Knows My Name

It was way back in the 1950’s that I became haunted by James Baldwin’s “Nobody Knows My Name”. Haunted is the right word. Personally, I saw in his writings a reflection of my own deeply ingrained racism. Professionally, I knew that as a Lutheran educator I needed to face up to the reality that the Brown vs. Board of Education decision would bring blacks also into the previously all white Lutheran schools. At an even deeper level I recall pondering what it would be like if, in fact, “Nobody Knows My Name” were true for me.

“Nobody Knows My Name” was not a personal reality for me. I was a fish in a very small pond where everybody knew everyone else’s name. In the small Lutheran community in Texas and the small German Lutheran community within that and the even smaller Missouri Synod community within that everybody knew my name. I was Melvin, the son teacher Kieschnick the most respected educator in that pond. I went to a very small Lutheran academy. Less than 50 students and everybody knew my name. It didn’t change when I went to Concordia Teachers College, a pond so small everybody knew everybody’s name, including mine. My circle stayed small; of course everyone in the Conference of Lutheran School principals of Northern California knew my name. Then I went to Hong Kong and within the small pond in which I swam everybody knew my name. I was the only American in most of those gatherings. And so it continued for another 40 years. In my small pond everybody knew my name. And that was “nice”.

The other day I was sitting at a lecture on anticipated changes in health care for seniors in America. I looked around. Nobody there knew my name. When I asked a question of the woman sitting next to me she glanced at my name badge and said, “I don’t think I know you.” When earlier this year I roamed corridors and exhibit hall at a national conference of Lutheran educators nobody knew my name. Even in my own congregation at clusters of those under 40 I am sure nobody knows my name. And I understand. I know I am now living in that huge pond named “retirement”.

All of this has led me to think about the millions in their world for whom “Nobody Knows My Name” is an entirely too common reality. They feel unnoticed, or neglected or just a cipher. What a tragedy.

Two reactions settle into my consciousness. 1. I will more often recall the words of the prophet who assured us that there is indeed One who “calls us by our name”. 2. I will work even harder to make sure I get the name of the persons with whom I have an interaction (no matter how casual) and call them by name. That way they will not be able to say, “Nobody Knows My Name.”