Taking comfort in familiar strangers

I’m spending three months in Chicago, on sabbatical, studying in the chaplaincy program at Rush University Medical Center.

A new town and lots of new colleagues. But it’s eerie how this happens. Several of the people in my program here remind me of newsroom staffers and others I know from Spokane. So there’s a lookalike for Mike, a copy editor. And for Mary Pat, wife of a former colleague. And even for Jim Camden, our Washington legislative reporter. And one guy has the exact voice of Andrew, a former beloved staffer now working for the New York Times.

It’s comforting to be around these “familiar strangers” and I liked them immediately because I like the people they remind me of.

Has this phenomenon ever happened to you?