She Looks Like My Mother

I sent my sister this link to an article about graduation rates and I titled it "Did You Know You Were In the NY Times?"

I found it when I was doing some research about graduation rates. The college Peter works for has a graduation rate of 60%--which is really bad. Peter's alma mater has an 80.5% graduation rate and mine is 87%. Although, I do have to point out that we had a lot of Orthodox Jewish girls who attended my school for the single purpose of finding a husband. Two girls who lived on my floor freshman year were married and had kids by the time I was a senior. So if it weren't for these teenage brides, I'm sure our graduation rate would have been higher.

I found this article and saw that the picture was taken at Amherst--then I thought to myself, "Wouldn't it be funny if Jenny were in the photo?" And then I saw that she was! It was pretty surreal. She's the girl who is staring at the camera in the right side of the photo.

After I sent her the photo, Peter told me to follow up with her so I gave her a call and said, "Did you get my email?"

"Yeah," she said. "I sent that to you months ago."

"Oh, so you knew you were in the photo?"

"Months ago."

"Don't you think you look like Mommy in that picture?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Your picture in the article."

Apparently, when I said, "You Were in the NY Times," she took that to mean that HER SCHOOL was in the NY Times and not that she, Jenny, was actually photographed in the article. So she opens her web browser and FREAKS OUT because she looks EXACTLY LIKE MY MOTHER in that photo. In fact, I have a photograph of my mother at her high school graduation and she looks EXACTLY like that.

She looks so much like my mother in that photo that Peter said, "Was your mother wearing Jenny's graduation gown at the graduation?"

So Jenny sends this link to all her friends and in her subject note, she wrote, "Don't I Look Exactly Like My Mom in this Photo?"

Her friends wrote back:

You buried the lead! This isn't a PHOTO, it's a photo from the NY Times. Your subject note made it seem like you looked like your mother from a snapshot you took recently.

And her friend Tranny wrote back:

I emailed you this article MONTHS AGO! BECAUSE YOUR PICTURE WAS IN IT!

Yes, Jenny is just that ditzy that she read the article without noticing her own face staring back at her in the photo.

After I told Peter about that, he said, "Well, THAT'S why you have to follow up with people. Tranny should know better...I mean, it IS Jenny."