When we have forgotten the past, the community helps us re-learn our own story. The case of "Benjamin Kyle" is instructive. In the early morning of August 31, 2004, employees of a Burger King in Richmond Hill, GA found a man unconscious next to a dumpster. He was naked, sunburnt, and had bites from red ants. His skull had three depressions, apparently from blunt force trauma. He also had amnesia and was unable to remember his own name, much less how he came to be found beaten behind a Burger King. The employees called 911, and he was taken to a hospital in Savannah; but without identity papers or memory, they listed him only as "Burger King Doe."

For more than ten years he was unable to remember his name and thus was unable to get a Social Security card. He could not obtain a job nor collect any kind of benefits from the government. He named himself "Benjamin Kyle," sensing that his first name might have been Benjamin, and he sought a community that knew him previously to help him piece together his identity. You see, without a community, this man had no access to his story. Finally, with the help of investigative reporters and genetic testing, "Benjamin Kyle" learned his real name and likely family of origin. As he started to identify with his community again he said, "Looking at all these names, all these people, kind of gives me a sense of belonging," he said. "I have a history. I'm not just some stranger that materialized out of thin air."