Doppleganger
The German’s have an interesting way of looking at things. Each language, of course seems to excel at something: English is so rabid to pick up new words, that we’ll just steal them or make them up; Italian, and Spanish are unsurpassed for cursing…But it’s the Germans who have always had a certain flair.
Who else would make up a word like Sangfroid. It means: “Cold blooded; extremely calm” but I’m also told that in some circumstances, it could be expressing a sort of pleasure at someone else’s misfortune.
Weird, right? But when you think about, there isn’t one of us who at one time or another thought, when something bad happened to someone you perhaps didn’t much like you might think: “It couldn’t have happened to a more deserving guy!”
So, maybe the Germans are onto something.
Doppleganger is another German word. Loosely, it means a “double”; an exact copy.
I’ve seen numerous friends’ Doppelgangers in the past, but when it happens to you, it’s quite different.
I used to be a professional photographer in L.A. for many years, and when I wasn’t shooting for a client I was shooting for me. I’d just returned from a trip to Mono Lake and had some landscapes I was too lazy to develop and proof myself.
I had just left the photo lab and turned down the sidewalk toward my truck when suddenly two enormous guys in suits appeared close by me on each side.
Bookends.
“Excuse me, Sir?”
One said.
He showed me his badge.
LAPD
Yikes!
Wait. I haven’t done anything…well, maybe speeding on L.A Brea, but these didn’t look “traffic” to me they looked “Detective”.
“Yes?”
“We noticed that you just got some pictures developed. Would you mind if we took a look at them?”
“What’s this about?”
“There’s a man, who matches your general description masquerading as a photographer and then raping the models and leaving them up in Angeles ‘ Crest.”
Yikes again…but wait I wouldn’t do that.
“Uh yeah, sure here is the proof sheet of what I just picked up.
36 B&W shots of Mono Lake (maybe half-dozen “keepers” in the bunch). I wasn’t all that happy with what I got on the trip, so I was less than over-joyed to show these around much, but they had a good reason.
They looked the shots over, seemed unimpressed, (to tell the truth there were maybe only two keepers in that roll).
Handing it back: “Thank you for your cooperation”.
“No problem. I hope you catch this guy!”
“Oh we will.”
Well, they didn’t.
Months later, I was in some doctor’s waiting room or something and low-and-behold, they have a current copy of TIME.
Okay, I’ll just catch up on what’s going on so long as I’m stuck just waiting here.
I thumbed through the periodical and when I got to the back, I was stunned.
1 picture, 1 column, 8 inches but it told me all I needed to know. The guy that those detectives were searching for in the L.A. Area, pulled the same thing outside of Denver and they caught him. By the time I’d heard about it, he’d already been sentenced to something like fifteen years, but the thing that really got was…
The picture.
Same general description, my ass!
It could have been of me!
At that point, at that moment I was pretty much the opposite of “Sangfroid”.
