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I wonder: does anyone actually remember me? If I did not stand up to wave, “Here I am,” would anyone recall me at all?

If I hadn’t reached out to old friends from school, would they ever have wondered what became of me?

If I didn’t try to reconnect with old friends from uni, would they ever have thought, “I wonder what happened to Tim?”

And those readers who once checked in at the height of the blogosphere: do they ever recall that I once moved amongst them?

What about family friends, in whose company we once enjoyed Sunday lunches and games in the park? Have we transitioned into oblivion, never to be recalled?

Would my name ever pop into the head of another, prompting them to seek me out? Or, in my life, have I touched no soul at all?

Am I forever the stranger just passing through, quickly forgotten if noticed at all?

As for those whose names I never forgot, who had such a profound impact on me: do they even recall me at all, or was all I thought I experienced all in my head?

Was I truly nothing to them at all, even in their contempt? Was it all just jest on autopilot for the latest geek to walk amongst them, presumed not to have feelings or a heart that could be broken?

In truth, I know the answer to that, for when I spoke to one of them in person, they couldn’t place me at all. A common reaction, it seems.

Even in-laws helped in the good times have completely forgotten us, every good deed done for them wiped from their minds. Such is the enmity seeded by envy and pride.

But what does it matter? For the One remembers us, terrifying and beautiful in equal measure, recalling both the bad we did and the good.

[And Luqmān said], “O my son, indeed if your deeds should be the weight of a mustard seed and should be buried within a rock or anywhere in the heavens or in the earth, God will bring it forth. Indeed, God is subtle and aware.

Quran 31:16

In the end, it doesn’t really matter if we are long forgotten by those we once walked amongst. It’s our relationship with the One who knows the intimate affairs of everything ever created that should be all-consuming. As says the One:

So remember Me; I will remember you. And be grateful to Me and do not deny Me.

Quran 2:152