Some folks insist the world has been quietly rearranged while the rest of us were asleep. They claim history is a slippery eel, memory is a liar with a respectable mustache, and somewhere in the machinery of the universe, somebody keeps moving the furniture.

They call this remarkable business the Mandela Effect, a title grand enough to excuse nearly any lapse that would otherwise be blamed on old age or poor attention. I have collected a few specimens of this peculiar phenomenon over the past seventeen years, much as a naturalist collects rare butterflies.

Most folks gather stamps or coins. I gather moments when reality appears to have misplaced its spectacles. They are uncommon enough to remain interesting and harmless enough that no committee has yet been appointed to investigate them.

This very morning, I believed Providence had delivered another fine exhibit.

Ever since Sting released ‘If You Love Somebody Set Them Free’ back in 1985, I have faithfully announced the title as any respectable radio man ought to do. I have said “set them free” with all the confidence of a preacher quoting Scripture.

It had become so familiar that I no longer thought about it, much as a man no longer thinks about breathing until somebody informs him he has been doing it incorrectly. Then I glanced at the computer tracking the music I play.

There it stood in plain electronic lettering, as bold as a courthouse clerk and every bit as convincing: ‘If You Love Somebody Let Them Free.’

Now, a machine has a dangerous reputation for honesty. People will argue with their neighbors, distrust politicians, and question newspapers, but should a computer display something on a glowing screen, half the population accepts it as though Moses had carried it down the mountain on a flash drive.

I looked at those words and immediately concluded I had spent the last forty years butchering poor Sting’s title. And the timing could not have been more unfortunate for me.

I had only seconds before opening the microphone, so I cheerfully confessed my lifelong blunder to the audience and blamed it on the Mandela Effect. It seemed as respectable an explanation as any, especially since blaming oneself has fallen terribly out of fashion.

Only after the microphone went silent did I have the luxury of investigating the matter. A few moments later, the truth appeared wearing no disguise whatsoever.

The computer was wrong. Someone, somewhere, at some forgotten hour, had entered the title incorrectly.

Sting had never invited anyone to “let” anybody free. He had always insisted they be “set” free, which sounds considerably more determined.

Naturally, I refuse to surrender my discovery altogether. I remain convinced that, after so many years at this station, that mistaken title had never appeared in the system before today.

If that isn’t a personal Mandela Effect, then it is at least a practical joke played by a mischievous keyboard and left for an unsuspecting announcer to stumble into before breakfast. Tomorrow I shall dutifully confess my error over the airwaves, which is an occupational hazard.

Every broadcaster eventually discovers that the microphone possesses a flawless memory while the audience develops one only when you’ve made a mistake. Fortunately, my offense amounted to little more than trusting a computer over my own recollection.

Besides, there are degrees of embarrassment in broadcasting. Misquoting Sting is a paper cut.

Calling your own radio station by the wrong call letters—that, dear reader, is a public hanging without the mercy of a quick drop. Every radio veteran has survived one, though most prefer to deny it until the witnesses have all retired.

So the universe remains intact for another day. Reality has escaped acquittal, the Mandela Effect has one less trophy to claim, and I have been reminded that computers, much like politicians and weather forecasts, deserve a healthy measure of skepticism before being repeated into a live microphone.