Beard of the Week LXXXVIII: Doppelgänger
Today's beard belongs to a man named Phil Jackson (b. 1945), unknown to me until today. A native of Montana (I like this bio in the "Cool Montana Stories" section of montanakids.com), Mr. Jackson is the current head coach for the LA Lakers basketball team; a position he held once before, Grover Cleveland fashion. He's had both hips replaced but, according to his girlfriend (quoted here), he's fully recovered, feeling great and moving younger. Here is his official NBA bio, in case that's of interest.
Mr. Jackson came to my attention thanks to a brief conversation I had with a relative stranger (I'd seen him before but we never talked) today at the Taco Bell that went like this:
"Hey," he says, "how many people have told you you look like Phil Jackson?"
"Up to this point," I responded, "none."
"Well, you look exactly like him–even your expressions. He is a little taller though, but you can't tell that if you're sitting down."
"That's cool," I said. "I've always wondered whom I looked like."
"Phil Jackson, definitely. Have a nice day."
"I'm sure I will now that I know whom I look like!"
The resemblance doesn't seem so striking to me, but I'm sure I see myself differently than others see me. On the other hand, I can see enough similarities that I can believe someone might feel that Mr. Jackson and I look rather alike. He is eleven years older than I, but I think he's looking quite good enough to be a model for how I should like to look when I reach 65.
Now while we're on the subject of look-alikes, I want to ask for some help identifying the circumstances or people in the photograph below. It is probably about 15 years old, this picture, evidently taken at a bear gathering of some sort. I ask because the middle of the three guys seated at the table in the foreground looks so uncannily like me–to me–that I sometimes wonder whether I was at this dinner and forgot about it. But how could I forget such delightful looking dinner companions?
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on Thursday, 8 April 2010 at 19.55
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Jackson is certainly not a bad person to look like. I always thought it would be fun to be mistaken for Robert Goulet, Alan Ladd or maybe Tom Selleck. Of course, it's a Walter Mitty thought. ;)