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Dear Doppelganger
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There is a theory that each of us has an exact copy of ourselves somewhere on Earth. If asked, I think that most Americans would agree with this statement, it is so commonly affirmed that we believe it is fact. I must add, however, that many Americans do not believe in the Theory of Evolution, some think that Hillary Clinton is still operating a child sex-trafficking business out of a pizza parlor in New Jersey and a dwindling few still hold that Tide Pods are edible and THEY CAN PROVE IT, so words like ‘belief’ and ‘thought’ may be somewhat relative terms here.
We call these doubles Doppelgangers and we, or at least I, love to look at them in magazines or online, especially the celebrity ones. In real life I can rarely tell identical twins alike even when they are dressed and coiffed differently. I use context to help me identify them but there’s always an underlining tension that I may have gotten it wrong. (I had a lovely cross-the-street neighbor for years who was Polish and just learning English when we moved in. She already spoke four other languages but we had none in common. She learned quickly and had a charming accent but she used to regularly get opposites wrong. She would say ‘far’ for ‘near’ and ‘blunt’ for ‘sharp’. I never corrected her, I didn’t think it was my place and I understood what she was saying which was probably more than she could say for me.) My point is this: what, at least on the outside, are the significant differences between any of us? Even the most ego-centric human being must recognize on some level that seen from Space we all look exactly alike. Like ants on a mound, we’re 100,000 to an ‘inch’.
I always liked the notion of Doppelgangers, its very romantic in the sense of Narcissus falling in love with himself. You here, you there, you forever everywhere. I don’t care about that part, I like the mystery of it, something that looks like me having an entirely unrelated life. Me but also not-Me.
Or so I thought until this week when scientists somewhere discovered/released/revealed that Doppelgangers who are unrelated by blood ties appear to have more DNA in common with the people who physically resemble them than one might think.
God, I love science. It’s like, or to be more strictly metaphorical it IS a metaphor machine – clouds, oceans, spinning planets, dead lights, black holes – it practically writes itself for you, right?
Oh, if only. Dear Doppelganger – here’s my eight word story for you
Dear Doppelganger
Please come soon
Bring the plot.

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You’re so much fun to read!

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