It’s a small world

To the editor:
    A casual conversation recently led to a coincidence involving Presque Isle, Caribou and Houlton. As I was leaving the Courtyard Cafe in Houlton during the Bicentennial, a man sitting at a table said, “That’s a nice outfit.”     “Thank you,” I replied. “I was thinking that you and your wife looked familiar. Should I know you?”
    “Probably not. I’m from Caribou and she’s from Norfolk, Virginia. That’s where we live. I met her there when I was in the Navy.” He introduced her and she added some details about their meeting.
    I told them that I never knew anyone from Caribou, only Presque Isle. “One girl graduated in ‘49 or ‘50.” When I mentioned her name, his response was surprise and disbelief, as it registered; then he said, “I dated her. I graduated in ‘48.”
    “But you were in Caribou and…”
    “I had a car. Some of us had cars and we got around. We double dated quite a bit.”
    When I told them where she lives now in New Hampshire, the man’s wife said, “We drove through there on our way up this time.”
    And so. two people recalled a third, from nearly 60 years ago — as if it were yesterday.
Byrna Porter Weir
Rochester, N.Y.