Have you ever been far away on vacation and swear that you see one of your friends or family? When my mother and I went to Las Vegas there was a man walking around the casino that looked EXACTLY like my father. He even walked the same. That was freaky.

Do you find that you assign looks to people that you only know through letters or the phone and then see strangers in the mall and think, "I wonder if that's so-and-so? That's what I think she'd look like."

Maybe I'm the only crazy one, I don't know.

-- Anonymous, July 22, 1999

Answers

I get that feeling all the time.. I see a stranger at least once or twice a day that I think 'Hey, isn't that so-and-so from college?', or 'Hey, didn't they work at such and such a place with me?'

And being that I'm the absolute worst person with names, it only hightens my feeling that I do know them and have forgotten their name or exactly what they look like.

I'm such a heel for not running up to them and saying 'hello.'

-rich http://www.inferiority.com

-- Anonymous, July 22, 1999

How about when you're on vacation and you DO see someone you know? I was in Poland and ran into a girl I knew from high school (in Alabama) who had been an exchange student. She was from France and I hadn't seen her in 3 years. That was insane. I really thought I was dreaming and I would wake up and say, "I had this crazy dream that I was in Krakow and ran into Minette Marsent - what would be the odds of that?"

My cousin was in Japan and ran into a guy from his hometown. Crazy.

-- Anonymous, July 22, 1999

It used to happen often enough in good old times when I was still vain and refused wear my glasses in public places...

Nowadays I only see Mart, like once or twice in year... Our desks used to be side to side in 1989, when I had just returned from Moscow and started to work in the archives.

The problem is, that Mart has been dead five years... and still I am quite sure I do see him on streets and in buses occasionally...

-- Anonymous, July 23, 1999

Oh jeez.. yesterday, I was sitting with some friends at our neighborhood bar/club/restaurant/hangout, and I saw this woman talking to a guy I kinda know. "oh it's that woman I used to hang out with like a year ago.. haven't seen her in a while... didn't know she knew that guy.." So I'm watching them talk, and something in her body language, or facial expression seems different, but I keep coming back to the shape of the head, the hair in a style she would wear --pulled into two short braids-, the cat-eye glasses.. So I walk over, sure that it's her, and I peek around her shoulder at her and I tug one of her braids. She looks at me. It's totally not the girl I thought it was, there is a striking resemblance, but this woman is about ten years older. and now she thinks I'm the most disrespectful person in the room. I spend about ten minutes apologizing and slink back to my seat. guh, usually I'm really good about recognizing people.

-- Anonymous, July 27, 1999

That happens to me all the time. Usually it doesn't take long to figure out that they aren't the person we think they are, but the similarities are still striking. When I was going to the University of Minnesota, I'd see people who I didn't really know everyday. And then I'd see people who looked like them, but weren't. Strangers resembling strangers. I also see quite a few people who are dead ringers for high school classmates, but who I _know_ are in another state.

Beyond general similarity, do you ever get the feeling of partial recognition? I'll be watching teevee with my girlfriend, and I'll say oh, that guy reminds me of (insert celebrity name).

"What? They don't look anything alike."
"Yeah, but they make the same facial expressions."

I dunno, does anyone else see similarities in people who don't look anything alike just based on body language and facial expressions? Like two people can have the exact same smile. I'm sure you've seem that.....

maybe I'm nuts.

am i nuts?

-- Anonymous, August 16, 1999

I used to work at a restaurant that was located very close to the local mall. During that time, I would constantly see people at the mall that I thought I knew, and I would smile and say Hi! and they would look at me funny and say hi..? and then I would think, who the hell was that? which is probably what they were thinking too, and then finally I realized that I didn't actually know these people but only recognized them from when they had come in to eat.

Oh, and yesterday I saw my very best friend (from behind) at Target. I snuck up on her, and was about to give her a hug from behind and startle her, when I smelled her perfume - Sand and Sable - and knew that it wasn't my friend, because she hates that stuff. But, since I had gotten close enough to smell her, she noticed I was there and turned around. I gave her a sheepish smile and darted into the make- up aisle. She had the same hair, kind of clothes and body style as my friend. Thank goodness Sand and Sable is so strong, or else I would have scared the shit out of this poor woman.

And one more thing, do you ever recognize someone and start to go up to them, then think better of it? I saw this girl from high school that I never really knew that well, but we'd had a few classes and never had a reason to dislike each other. Something about seeing a familiar face always causes a knee-jerk reaction in me to say something, but this time I actually thought before I spoke, and realized that I had nothing at all to say to her. She had gone on a few dates Junior Year with the guy who is now my husband. I suppose I could have told her that, then we would have smiled fakely, nodded awkwardly and then had nothing else to say and had to find a way out of the non-conversation without seeming rude, so I though why the hell should I put us both through that? and just walked away instead. I acted like I didn't see her, and later I saw that she saw me and thought maybe she recognized me. If she did, she apparently made the same decision I did, because we never spoke.

-- Anonymous, August 31, 1999

I guess that whole "Let's just pretend we didn't see each other" thing has happened to me recently, but from the other end. I was picking up food at a local restaurant when I noticed that a guy with whom my girlfriend used to work was there. I gave that little look of recognition you give when you see someone you know but are too far away to really start up a conversation at the time, but the look sort of says, "I'll be right there." Then he just looks at me very squarely and slowly shakes his head. Maybe he and the girl he was with were in a very heated silent discussion and he just didn't want me to interupt. Maybe he mistook me for a spy (meaning that he's a spy, too) and this wasn't a safe place to exchange the microfilm. At any rate, my food wasn't ready so I had to sit there for 5 minutes avoiding eye contact and doubting myself as to whether or not it was this guy. Now I'm just waiting for him to try and talk to me next time I see him. I'll show him. Ha!

-- Anonymous, September 02, 1999