An unusual name has certain benefits. For example, you get to think you're the only one on earth, viz, I was 15 years old before I met another Jessica. This exclusiveness was mitigated big-time when the name Jessica became the most popular one for girls somewhere along about 20 years ago. That roar has died down but not so much that I don't frequently hear my name called by someone decidedly not trying to gain my attention. (Too many negatives in that sentence, i.e., I'm constantly turning around in grocery stores only to see someone, shall we say, considerably younger, responding appropriately.)
Now consider my last name. Very few Lipnacks (originally Lipniak, meaning white wood or linden tree, in Polish and Ukrainian, we've been told). At least I thought there were very few until a cousin, Alan Blank, appeared out of nowhere (well, San Diego) long about seven years ago, with his father, Jules, in tow. Turned out said father was my father's first cousin. Family reunited.
Comes then a message this past week from an Allyson Lipnack, saying that she only knows one Jessica Lipnack, who happens to be 17. Yes, friends, I have a doppelganger, and now Jessica Jr, as she's dubbed herself, and I are friends in the one truly modern way - on Facebook. So, Jess Jr., we'll have to start working on some really good stories that we can use to confuse people for many years to come. (And thanks to Cousin Alan, who follows such things, all the lines of connection are being drawn back to the old country where Jr's great-grandfather and my grandfather were most likely cousins in the small town of Mishnitz.)
