That Reminds Me of a Story.

Once a few year ago, on my lunch hour, I went to a sandwich place, Au Bon Pain. I'm very international, you see. As I ordered my sandwich (au jus) the woman behind the counter said, "You know who you look like? You look like that one opera guy."

"Opera guy?" I asked, hesitantly.

"Yeah," she said, "you know, that one. Sings loud."

"Pavarotti," I smiled, certain she meant someone else.

"Yes! That's it, Pavarotti! You look just like Pavarotti!"

Several years before that glorious moment, I worked for a summer at a small grocery store near an apartment building where a lot of elderly people lived. The same few would show up in the market at the same time every day and buy just a couple of items because, I suppose, they couldn't carry much. (Too bad they didn't think to get an old lady cart like this one.) There was one tiny woman who, like clockwork, arrived at 3:15 every afternoon. One day, she studied me quizzically for a few minutes before walking to the counter.

"Do you know who you look like?" she asked.

In that moment, I wondered who it could be. Some Golden Age film star -- Erroll Flynn, maybe? Or hey, I thought, how about a Cool Hand Luke-era Paul Newman?

"Who?" I said.

"Sylvester Stallone!"

I must have looked a tad disappointed, perhaps even crestfallen. "What's the matter," she asked, "don't you like Sly?"

"No, not really . . . "

"That's okay," she said. "I think he's real ugly."

So when I got an email recently from an acquaintance who said she saw a guy who looked just like me, what else could I think but, "That lucky bastard!"