Doppleganger

Apparently, some reporter in California has been stalking my life. Well, clarification, small portions of my life, that are three years old. A friend of mine found this article in the San Fransicsco Chronicle, and the reporter shares my name, and wrote a one sentence blurp about me.

I'm highly amused right now. Haha....


"My doppelganger is having a more interesting life.

I know this because every time my byline appears in The Chronicle, I get letters, passionate letters full of energy and what seems like devotion, asking about her.

The first was a phone call, years ago.

"Are you the Heidi Benson I met on the train on the way to Barcelona?"

Right away, I can feel the reassuring rumble of the train, I hear the rhythmic clack-clack of the metal wheels. It is night, late, the compartment is cozy, red-lit with dark-wood walls, green curtains frame a moving landscape, mountains barely seen... We're sharing a lukewarm bottle of sparkling wine...

You see, he had this voice. A slightly tremulous, benevolent baritone. He sounded terribly interesting, terribly handsome - and, well - smitten.

But I've never been to Spain. It wasn't me. I almost said "Yes!" What would have happened if I had?

Now, we all know about doppelgangers - shadow walkers, "evil twins," portents.

Not long before Shelley drowned in a boat in a storm off Liguria, he told his wife, Mary, that he'd seen himself walking, looking troubled, on the beach.

On the day Lincoln was elected president, he saw a vertical image of himself in a mirror - but with two faces, one ghostly pale. He was tired, he'd just won the election - he shrugged it off. But it happened again, and again. When he told his wife, Mary, she interpreted it to mean he would win two terms as president, but would not live through the second.

Now that doppelgangers are digital, they're not so profound. If one of yours behaves badly or spends time in jail - and if evidence of their existence might keep you from getting a high-security job at Lawrence Livermore Laboratory, say - there are services to scrub your online reputation clean, or make you a brand-new one.

"Are you the Heidi Benson who worked on the Anderson Ranch in Aspen?"

When I got this call, I wanted desperately to answer: "Yes, of course! You came by to play poker with the other cowboys and saw me ride up, bareback, on my palomino, hair flying. That was me. I can prove it. I have cowboy boots."

That I bought those boots in Sorrento and have had a lifelong fear of horses had nothing to do with my urgency in that moment, just in that moment, to be that Heidi Benson.

But I couldn't lie. "No,' I said, 'I've never been to Aspen." What I could do - from backstage,where I'm most comfortable - was to search Google.

I learned that there are many Bensons who thought it was a good idea to name their daughters after the Swiss orphan from a children's book who was played in the movie by Shirley Temple. Go figure.

There's a Heidi Benson who is a consultant at the Know Yourself spa for burned-out executives in New Mexico.

There's the one who went hang-gliding off Mount Everest - there are pictures, somewhere - as a member of the American Alpine Club.

There's the scientist at the National Engineering and Environmental Lab in Idaho Falls who is studying ringing in ears, hypothyroidism, depression and memory loss (I have all four!).

There's the Heidi Benson who is senior editor of Family Life magazine and the author of a four-month study called "Timeless Toys."

There are a number of athletes - the coordinator of Central Iowa Aquatics; a third-place winner in the Ashtabula Triathlon. She's 17; there's a fieldhockey hotshot at Northeastern University in Boston; there's the certified scuba diver on a theater scholarship at Monmouth College in Illinois.

In Michigan, there's a homeschooled pianist who shared second place in the 2007 Germania Young Musical Artist Award by playing "Toccata" by Khachaturian.

(HA. Okay. That's me. [/amusement])

On the subset of Heidi Bensons who appear in photos, the majority are blond. And they are - to a Heidi - smiley, cute, healthy, perky, outdoorsy.

Now, I like my life. I like being a brunette. I'm glad I took the road I traveled. I feel lucky. But I am weak. Identity is a slippery serpent. And the doppelgangers keep turning up.

The latest emerged on Sept. 11 this year, when I got an e-mail saying: "We really enjoyed your Sunday feature. Was your father John Benson from Belfast?" - Tom & Sheila Foley
I wrote back, saying, "No relation - tell me more."

"John Benson was from Ireland. He lived in Alameda and had a daughter named Heidi. John was a member of the Encinal Yacht Club. He died around 20 years ago during a sailboat race to the Farallon Islands sponsored by the St. Francis Yacht Club. A sudden storm came up during the race and he and the boat he was on - Bad Sneakers - were never found."

Bad sneakers? He was wearing bad sneakers and he fell off the boat? No, the name of the boat was Bad Sneakers.

Oh, the poor man. His poor daughter! Imagine - your father and his boat, never found.
I lost my father in a transportation accident. Maybe I should meet her. Could we talk?

"There is a memorial plaque to John Benson at the Encinal Yacht Club," Tom Foley tells me, "and I also think his daughter was involved with newspapers."

Then he gave me her phone number - Heidi Benson Finberg - in the 510. She's in the East Bay. I'm afraid to call. Who would pick up?"

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/12/02/CM5MSQBRV.DTL