Real Washington insiders, or people who just grew up in the area, know this rule: When you encounter someone and introductions are made, hands are shaken, the thing you say is not “Nice to meet you.” The thing you say is “Nice to see you.”

It obviates those awful moments when one person remembers meeting and the other doesn’t: “Hi, SM, nice to meet you.” “Oh, we’ve actually met.” “Have we?” Embarrassment, guilt, shame, awkwardness. All of it avoided with NTSY.

I suspect it began as a genius CYA political tactic, perfect for Washington, because when I say NTSY it does not necessarily mean I have met you before. Maybe I have, maybe I haven’t. Either way I’m covered: I’m looking at you right now, and whether it’s for the first or the fifth time, gee, it really is nice to see you.

(Maybe it’s because everyone is constantly blackout drunk in D.C. that NTSY became an accepted custom.)

Most people inside the “Beltway” (a 15-lane highway that circles Metro D.C.) get it. Nobody looks at you crosswise when you say it here to someone you are 99% sure you’ve never met. But in other places NTSY is a foreign concept. They give you this unmistakeable reaction: Their face and body frame contract into a puzzled and defensive pose for a quick second. Their eyes squint, they panic, because they are searching their memory bank to see if you are in it. So I like to use it everywhere, to disarm people. I also like to shake people’s hands with my left hand. No one knows how to react to that either. Double whammy!

(Other industry towns have their own tricks. In Hollywood, I believe it’s “I love your work!” because everyone does some kind of work they need you to love.)

It doesn’t matter if I’m in your memory bank! Live in the now moment! Drink up, you’ll see what I mean.

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Unlike me, politicians have to make everyone feel special, even ugly babies and abject morons.

Someone I know knows someone who has seen (a.k.a. met) Hillary Clinton several times, and this person bore witness to the following master-class moment: When HRC meets someone and says NTSY they often excitedly, mistakenly think she actually does recognize them. If they say, by way of reminding her just in case, “I met you at the such-and-such event!” she reinforces the illusion like the pro she is: She grasps their hand, looks into their eyes and says with heart, “Wasn’t that a wonderful day?”

Every day is wonderful, you see. So you can’t go wrong.

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Everyone is new to NTSY at some point. I remember my first receiving line in D.C. It was my first time I lived here, when I was doing my college internship at a government agency that no longer exists (not my fault). My office worked on educational exchanges with foreign countries.

One night we were invited to a big reception on the 8th floor of the State Department building, in honor of Senator Fulbright, who was 87 years old and in a wheelchair. The hostess of the event was former Vice President Hubert Humphrey’s sister, Frances Humphrey Howard, who looked just like Hubert Humphrey in a wig. Nice lady, devoted her life to charity, I gather.

My job, very “interny,” was to hand out the name tags at this event, and check people’s State Department credentials. Also must have helped with catering: I have in my notebook from the time: “I put a miniature reuben on Mrs. Howards’s plate, and found myself asking the ambassador from Madagascar where the forks were.”

When that was done, without really understanding why, I got in the receiving line, and as I got closer I could hear her saying “Nice to see you!” to everyone who came up to shake the Senator’s hand. She was standing to his left, being the introducer. He didn’t say much, so she was in charge of NTSYs.

It made me feel like such a country mouse: Everyone else in this line already knows this famous D.C. lady except me!

When my turn came I curtsied to Frances Humphrey Howard and bowed and said something lame to Senator Fulbright, like, “Um, thank you, sir, for giving out so many scholarships. That is very generous of you.” He nodded with a vacant smile and looked to my right for the next NTSY.

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One time after college was over I spent an evening with some right-wing Republican homosexual males who had tattoos of eagles and American flags and the like on their arms. This was back in the early ’90s. But even then it was v. v. uncool to be gay and Republican. I was just appalled at them and their rationalizations for existing. The more they talked, the more visibly disgusted I turned.

We abruptly got up to leave, and the false consciousness guys’ faghag, a plump, very pleasant young lady who did not like conflict and had been on edge all night and now was totally flustered, told us in a conciliatory tone as we rushed out the door: “Well, it was NICE to MEET you!”

I then told her exactly what I was thinking, with a sorrowful exhalation:

“I wish I could say the same thing.”

I really meant it, too! I hate bad evenings with jerks.

Tags: Beltway, District of Columbia, Frances Humphrey Howard, Fulbright, Hillary Clinton, Hubert Humphrey, State Department, USIA