As everyone knows, the freshman picture book at Harvard was called "Facebook." But at Brown - ever the wacky - we called ours the "Pigbook." I wish I had mine still, but a cute (Canadian hockey player) boy from down the hall asked to borrow it and never returned it. Bummer.
But one thing I remember quite vividly from our freshman year was that most people upon meeting me for the first time thought they recognized me from the Pigbook as another girl. This other girl had a last name similar to mine, but her first name was different. She also had Scandinavian features, and in particular had one of those upturned noses.
Mine is pretty upturned. In fact, people used to call me "Pig Nose" in my youth. One night while I was working at the local frozen yogurt joint, a whole group of people taped up their noses. To this day I'm not sure whether it was meant to poke fun of me or whether their fun was entirely unrelated.
But this girl definitely had a pig nose.
At first it bugged me that folks kept mistaking me for her, but then after awhile I figured it wasn't a big deal, because they weren't calling me "Pig Nose" even if that might be one of the features (as well as our similar last names) that made us seem like the same person.
Well, last week, one of my sons pointed to a fairly unattractive woman across the parking lot who was wearing a neon green shirt, chinos, and some other assortment of fashion don'ts. (Seriously, most people cannot carry off a cropped-pant look, so just don't.) "Hey mom, that looks like your twin!"
Uh, WHAT?
I looked at the woman, wondering what made her my twin. I'm guessing it was the short stature, the ample bosom, and the same hair color/length. I'm hoping it wasn't some of the less attractive features of her, although I definitely slapped myself mentally on the wrist for being so superficial.
"It must be cool to have a twin because then you know what you look like," my son told me.
Well, "cool" might not be the right word for it, but it is definitely revealing to see how others perceive you, bacon bits and all.
