Doppelgangers and so forth

When I lived in London as a 20 year-old student, I went into a local chemist's to pick up some photos I'd had developed, and the shop clerk (who was my same age, height and build, although she did have red hair) gasped when she saw my name and said, "That's my name, too!"

We were delighted with ourselves about this, so we had a nice cheery chat about our lives, which further delighted us because she thought it was cool that a girl named Ann Edwards came from America, and I thought it was awesome that a girl named Ann Edwards came from Ireland. We said good-bye and never saw each other again.

But I think about her sometimes. Did she go back to Ireland? Stay in London? Did she marry? Have children? Get an education? Did she ever wonder if Ann Edwards from America was still alive and possibly having the life she would have had if she were Ann Edwards from America?

Now and then I wonder about the other lives I might have had. Do you? I even envision those other lives running like parallel shadows to my real life here and now, and sometimes I wish I'd get a postcard to update me on the everything that happened instead.