You are out and about, doing stuff. You encounter other people, perhaps talk to them, go about your business. Someone comments, “that person you were just talking to, was that your twin?”
My question is, if someone looked exactly like you, would you realize it in the moment? By “exactly”, I mean probably not the same hairstyle or clothing, perhaps even a difference in, say, piercings, but mainly just the same facial features and body type.
How familiar are you with what you look like that would would be able to recognize that someone looks just like you?
Over the years, I have been mistaken for three other people or had them be mistaken for me. My favorite was our own late, great, TubaDiva. We would get mistaken for each other all the time and we found it hilarious, especially because she had that southern belle voice and mine is clearly northern Midwest. The first time we met in person I was able to see that she had the same color hair and wore the same style glasses I had just replaced so I understood it when, two weeks later, someone from Minnesota who was in Atlanta started talking to her like she was me. But it kept up for years and also included people who thought I was her. It was very entertaining.
She was my favorite doppelganger and I miss her very much.
I’ve always thought that an old good friend of mine I’ve known since school looks a lot like me. Though he’s about 20 cm taller than me, he has the same skull and hair like me. We could be brothers.
I resemble Stephen King. (Wish my income resembled his’n!) I once got asked in a restaurant. Later, I over heard the guy telling his friend, “You know, he writes those scary-ass books.”
The only time I’ve encountered someone who looked like me was during jury selection. I got sent home, and quite possibly because I looked very, very much like the criminal defendant! He really did look just like me, and I certainly recognized it, just about the first instant I saw him.
That’s really, really weird. Because I’ve been hearing “You look just like Stephen King!” for thirty-five years. And I truly do.
That’s how I recognize that a coworker looks very much like me - he looks like Stephen King.
I did once have to show a woman my driver’s license to prove to her that I wasn’t…sigh… Gary Busey.
(Do I get Brad Pitt? Tom Hiddleston? Benedict Cumberbatch? No. I get mistaken for Stephen King, Gary Busey, and, once when I had long hair, Vincent from Beauty and the Beast)
I was pumping gas a few weeks ago, and the guy on the other side of the island and I kept looking at each other. Finally, I said, “Now I know what I would look like with a beard.” He grinned and took off.
I have never noticed my doppelgangers. Probably because it turns out they are just another big guy with a beard. Apparently people don’t look at any further detail once they see a big guy with a beard.
I think I would notice if I would think they looked like me (as in, if I were looking at, say, a video of us, I wouldn’t be surprised). But I do find that the featurs I consider important in a person often aren’t the same as others. I’ve seen many people claim people look alike when I can’t see it at all.
There was also once a contest when I was in high school where we would bring in our baby pics, and people would guess who was who. I never thought I looked anything like my baby pic, but no one had trouble picking me out. Granted, I don’t know how much process of elimination was involved, but I admit I was surprised.
Though, since then, I’ve become aware that my nose is rather unique.
When I was in the Air Force, stationed at Shaw AFB, SC, in the mid-80s, I saw my look-alike. In fact, he had walked into the dining hall and I happened to glance over and my jaw dropped. It was so weird. And I saw him several times over those few years. And folks would constantly get us confused. I never approached him, though.
There was a woman who worked in the same downtown area that I did. One day my boss came in the office and said, “oh, you’re here! I thought I just saw you going into the YMCA and was going to ask you what you were doing.” After that there were several more instances that we were confused for one another. I personally didn’t see it. We had a similar haircut and color and the same glasses. Other than that I don’t know what people saw that was so similar.
My three sisters and I all think that we look totally different. We have different shaped faces, noses, eye shape, we’re all brunettes but different shades, different heights and body shapes. When we’re all together, we always have people (strangers) say that they can tell we’re sisters and that we looks so much alike. We always laugh about it because we don’t see it at all.
I don’t think we see the same thing in the mirror that other people see.
I’m not sure if I would recognize my doppelgänger. I’ve been tricked by my reflection in a window a few times where I didn’t realize it was me until it matched my movements.
Over the years I have several times had people insist that I was Jeremy Irons.
I have never met him nor seen him live but have actually signed autographs for people who were insistent and was pulled out of lines in Vegas showrooms and restaurants with a “You don’t to stand in line Mr. Irons. Please follow me.”
Last year when I was in the hospital there was a Polish nurse on the floor who kept popping in just to smile at me. Finally she said “Are you …” and I interrupted her and told her I was not. She smiled knowingly and asked if I would send her an autographed picture.
Yes, I can see the resemblance. We are the same age. This has been going on since the movie “Dead Ringers” came out.
I attended a good-sized college for the era, maybe 10K students total. One day I saw me walking across one of the courtyards. He even had my walk. I was in the part of the campus where most of my major classes were and I spent a lot of time there. I never saw him again.
A strange sensation to be sure.
In my 30s to 50s people many people said I looked a lot like Bill Gates who’s just a few years older than me. Some of these folks worked at Microsoft HQ albeit not as part of his regular entourage. They would have seen Bill in person from time to time though. As he’s gotten older the resemblance has faded; his looks have softened more than mine have (yet).
Many many years ago, on more than one occasion, I was told by different young ladies that I looked exactly like their boyfriends. In one case, I was shown a picture, and I got why they thought so - general shape and features and coloring, but of course I could see that they weren’t really that close. In another case, the young lady brought her guy to a party we were both attending to get us to meet. Again, he was similar in general shape and features and coloring, but again - not really that close. He did have prominent eyebrows, which is one of my unique traits, but that was about it.
I guess I don’t have a generic look*, more quirky, so I don’t run into doppelgangers.
*ISTM that there are a few generic looks that some guys rock that makes them more prone to doppelgangers: Beefy shaved head with goatee, beefy flannel shirt bushy red beard beer aficionado - to name a few.
Someone came up to me in a Paris Cafe and asked (in English) if I was Allen Ginsberg. Same thing happened to me in the Montreal airport.
Someone else told me I looked just like James DePriest who was at the time the conductor of the Quebec Symphony Orchestra. He ended up as the conductor of the Oregon Symphony Orchestra. He didn’t look anything like me when we were HS classmates and I have my yearbook to prove it.