Thursday 31 December 2015

DOPPELGÄNGER DILEMMA


Hello. My 2015 was ridiculously average and uneventful. I managed to graduate, and land myself a cool job, which I also spontaneously quit (much to the dismay of a lot of people.) There was hardly any travel, and therefore no exaggerated stories to brag about. My phone’s camera went into a coma. It’s been five months now. (#PrayForMyPhone) There’s like a dark cloud of a quarter-life crisis all set to rain over me. But this post is about a more pressing issue at hand. Something, that is gnawing at the peace of my mind. It is absolutely erratic. Don’t laugh at me. Okay? Okay.
I SEE PEOPLE IN OTHER PEOPLE.

For example. I was once hovering around in my college when I saw this blingy group of kids making small talk. I recognised one of them as a senior, S, from school. It was so refreshing to see S after all this while, especially after he had moved back to his home in Thailand. I gave him a loud slap on the back and almost went “Brooooo!”, when in that split second I realised that it wasn’t him! It was somebody else with the exact make and demeanour as his. Honest mistake. I apologised and made myself scarce immediately. This could be one isolated incident. The stuff that happens to everybody once in a while. But, similar incidents involving different people occurred with me again, and again; became routine. Except now, I only kept this discovery to myself. Obviously.

A teacher who bore an uncanny resemblance to a friend’s mother. A shorter version of a Pakistani actor at my workplace. A friend’s friend who looked like another friend’s friend. A lot of girls at a literature fest who convincingly passed off as a particular somebody I knew of. Two different sets of alike people at work. Random stranger in train with the mistaken appearance of a prick from a youth organisation where I had once worked. Random dude at gym who looked like a 10-years-later version of my brother. Wimpy junior at school who had the replicate eerie countenance as the 10-year-old me. It is a strange strange world brewing inside my brain.

Almost everyday, there is a new doppelgänger. And these are all strangers. Forcing me to walk through my memory-maze and connect their faces to people I know. Maybe, life is subtly implying that I have a subconscious yearning for the people in my past. Either that philosophical stuff, or my mind is totally bonkers (coupled with my refusal to wear my spectacles.)

My best friend, who usually becomes my cheap shrink after 2 AM, is now indifferent to these new conditions of mind that I am continuously coming up with. I zone out a tad more than what is considered normal. But now you will know, that I am probably just processing a new doppelgänger.  So excuse me, will you?

Peace, ho!

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