So I thought I was sitting next to someone who I’ve only ever read about. Not in celebrity magazines or online, but someone from a friend’s story. I picked the seat simply because it was the closest one on the aisle, which I love to sit on in planes, and I didn’t realize it until we were in the midst of takeoff.

            I’d just read through my friend’s story about his brother. It was well written, and I felt like I could see him in the story, but when it comes to picking someone out of a crowd based on the written description of them I’m terrible. If I could only have seen him interact with someone in the way that I saw him in the story, I would have known for sure. But I simply had a description of him as not suffering from male-pattern baldness but still shaving his head, intimidating, raspy voice, somewhere in the neighborhood of 37 now, and not having baby-blue eyes. The tattoo that would clench it is on his chest above his heart, and since this guy’s wearing a white thermal, I have no idea if he has a tattoo or not.

            I almost asked him several times if he was the one that the story was based on. I wouldn’t have phrased it that way, mostly because I don’t know if he knows he’s the subject of his brother’s story, but I nearly talked to him just to find out if he even had a brother. That’s saying something since I don’t so much like to talk to people who I don’t know.

            But then I wondered how many times we do things like this – sit next to people we’ve heard stories about without meeting and never know that the person from the story is a hand’s breadth away? How many people do I know their secrets without knowing their face? And what if all they needed was to know that there was someone out there who knows them? How many people’s days would be made with the simple act of finding out that they are talked about? What a weird, interesting idea. Maybe there should be a story. I love traveling.