Even My Daughter Applied to be Her Third Child. Not That I Blame Her.

Last Sunday, I sat trying to write a column on suffering through this winter’s iron grip. But staring out the window, blue skies and 60 degree temperatures beckoned.

How could I write about enduring cold, gray weather when it was beautiful outside? I closed my document, walked passed a teetering wall of dirty laundry and leashed the dog for a run. As we jogged along Harris Street, a father on a bike with his two children approached. Looking me straight in the eye he called, “HI, DR. HALL.”

I waved and kept running. It took a few strides before the incredible depth of his cheery greeting hit me.

He thinks I’m Pamela Hall. As in “the” Dr. Pamela Hall.

WOW!

For the first time in my life, I’d been mistaken for a…superhero.

My back straightened and I ran a little less goofy. My I.Q. vaulted 30 points and I adjusted my cape. Why this case of mistaken identity? Okay, when I pull my hair back into a pony tail, all my beautiful gray highlights are more noticeable. Dr. Hall flaunts her gray and we are the same height.

But there are obvious differences. Pamela is runner-thin as in a lean, mean, less-than-8-minutes-per-mile kind of way. She is smart. She figured out my appendix was the size of an inner tube floating down the Chattahooee when no other medical professional could after looking at 20 trillion painful CT scans.

Even my daughter has applied to be her third child. I can’t blame her. Dr. Pamela saves lives all day then takes her children cool places like pottery shows, plays and to the library ~ but not in a car. They run to the library. Last holiday season, she made an amazingly clever broccoli Christmas tree appetizer of her own creation. She’s Dr. Meredith Grey and Mary Decker Slaney crossed with Martha Stewart.

She saves the environment with her pristine laundry habits. Championing homegrown, organic foods, Dr. Hall probably can spell horticulture without having to rely on spell check.

I loved being her.

This could have worked. I needed to buy a white jacket and wear glasses. I could whip my hair up into a knot, throw on my white jacket and go around town buying fresh produce. While dispensing Tic Tacs and lollipops to all children with runny noses, I would knowingly nod in a superhero, Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman kind of way.

My run ended as I reached my driveway. No white 4-door Ford pickup? My car had been stolen! Alas, the silver Suburban parked there was mine. I was not Dr. Hall anymore than tomorrow it would reach 80 degrees. Both realizations made me a bit sad.

I couldn’t help but ask my husband. Did he think me anything like Dr. Hall? More pointedly, would he like for me to be her? He thought a moment.

“Well, first I’d need to see her housekeeping skills.”