Have you ever met a stranger, who you never saw again, that you still think about?

[Backinthe1960s]

It was at my local stamp club. We didn't get many new members turning up so when one did we all to used to make a big effort to make them feel welcome. It was the night of our annual quiz and he and I were in the same team. He seemed a really nice bloke with a vast knowledge of stamps and postal history and I thought he would be a good recruit for the club. Afterwards we went for a quick drink at the local pub, he paid for a drink for the two of us, then he went off towards the gents toilet.

I never saw him again and he never came back to the stamp club. For ages I wondered what happened to him.

I passed my double walking round Alton Towers. She looked just like a younger version of me. We sort of stared at each other but I often wish I had stopped her for a chat .

In 2008 or 2009 I was in a bar in Newcastle city centre at a retirement do. As I went outside for a cigarette a woman walking past collapsed in front of me. It was early evening and she was wearing office clothes and carrying a briefcase type bag.

Me and a couple of others went to her aid but it was clear she was seriously ill. A first aider arrived and put her in the recovery position and an ambulance was called. The poor woman kept holding her head as if that was the source of her pain but she couldn't talk and just groaned. I still remember talking to her and telling her everything was going to be fine but she didn't know I was there. The ambulance arrived a few minutes later and the paramedics were amazing and took her to hospital. I suspect she may have had a stroke but have no medical training. I think about her often and hope she made a good recovery.

I used to work in a club and one slow night there was a gentleman in who just looked so bereft with his beer that I asked him if he was OK. He told me he has been with his wife for 12 years and they'd been trying for a baby for 10 years with lots and lots of heartbreak (had all the tests, had had IVF, it was unexplained infertility). He was on a business trip and told me he felt so unable to make his wife happy, he thought it was his fault and was thinking about walking away so she could find happiness and have babies with a man who could provide properly for her. It broke my heart. I told him to stick at it, if he loved her then that's all that mattered etc.

I did wonder how he got on until he came back about a year later and showed me a picture of his 6 week old twins and gave me a massive tip! I was made up for them!

NCd as this could out me!

Aged 19 I babysat a few times for a toddler at a farmhouse in the middle of nowhere. I worked there one summer afternoon and pushed the baby for a walk in his buggy along narrow, quiet country lanes as suggested by the mum, and just had to pull in to one side when a tractor passed us a few times with a young male farm worker in it. I smiled back as he passed but didn't think anything of it.

The following week, I babysat again in the evening. The mum of the little boy told me cryptically that there may be a knock at the door that evening, and that I should open it. Sure enough, there was, and standing there was the tractor driver with a bouquet of flowers! He handed them over and said that I had the loveliest smile he had ever seen and that he had been thinking about me all week. I was so shocked I just about managed to say thanks, then he walked away and left.

The mum of the toddler told me later that he had asked when I would be return so that he could give me the flowers. It was terrible timing as I was about to move away for uni a few days later and starting a relationship with someone back home wasn't really on the cards.

He was very attractive when I saw him at the door and obviously very thoughtful, and I wonder what happened to him...no doubt has made some lady a lovely husband. Not that I can complain, as I have a lovely DH too.

Love this thread!

years ago I was flying home from a work trip and waiting by baggage carousal when I noticed a young woman who looked completely strung out. She was pacing back and forwards, anxiously watching for her bags. We both arrived at phone booths (pre mobile days!) at the same time and stood side by side. I was waiting for my bf to pick up on my call when I heard the most awful keening sound from her - I will never forget the intense pain in her cry. She collapsed to the floor, holding the receiver. I went to help her, she just looked at me with such anguish and handed me the phone. It was her brother who told me that their mother had just died. The girl had been trying to make it home in time to say goodbye and missed her mums last moments. I spoke with him and told him I would get her through to arrivals and wait until their other brother got there. She had been hysterical but suddenly went quiet and followed me like a small child. I sat with her, held her and waited. I have never been so aware of someone's sheer soul wrenching pain. Her brother arrived and I left. They hadn't spoken a word - just held each other. I think of her often.

a happier one ....
dp and I were in Amsterdam for NYE 2005. It was magical - it snowed and all the canals / lanes were covered in deep fluffy snow. We wandered around for hours, feeling so happy and in love. There were families out celebrating, people hugging on the bridges with fireworks and firecrackers going off everywhere. We eventually found ourselves in Dam Square and were standing together, wrapped in hats, scarves, gloved etc. An elderly couple were standing close by and were smiling at us. They came over, gave us a bottle of champagne and 2 beautiful deep purple champagne flutes, saying that we looked like they did when younger and so in love that they wanted us to celebrate our youth and passion. I was shocked, as was dp. We all hugged before they left. It was such a random but lovely thing, I think it made me fall even more in love. We kept those glasses and dd1 lives to hear the story. I always think of them and their spontaneous kindness.

I went to a stuffy old meeting with my old boss, evening do, lots of networking. The only person nearly my age was introduced to me within minutes and he was gorgeous. We spent the evening chatting, got on fantastically well. He was thinking about going travelling and I told him that my ex-flat mate had done it and what a fantastic time she had. When I left for BF to pick me up I seriously considered dumping him so I could go back to meet this guy, the connection (for me) was so strong.

FF a month and I went for a night out. Gorgeous guy was there - his leaving do. I went over to say hi and he said he'd listened to what I said about my flat mate and was doing it, was so excited. As I wished him well and went back to my BF he whispered in my ear "You can come with me if you want".

I wish I had.

Very many years ago, I was on honeymoon in Florida. My husband wanted to go on a ride that I couldn't stomach so I sat it out...he was in the queue for over an hour and I got chatting to a Vietnam Veteran who was waiting for his wife, he couldn't go on the ride due to war injuries. I could have talked to him all night and was almost disappointed when husband re-appeared. I wish I had found a way to stay in touch, he was a fascinating man and 20 odd years later, I still think of him.

DD and I sat together on a flight from Italy to the UK. Somehow DH ended up sitting a good few rows behind.
The older man next to us chatted away to DD and I. He had the most interesting life - he was a circus performer, lived between the US and Italy and was coming to his DDs graduation in the UK. He asked for my email address to invite us all to his home in Italy but I never heard from him.
DD often asks if I think he remembers meeting us. I think he realised how shy she is and he put her at ease. Now if we have a stranger beside us who doesn't smile or speak, she says later that they "weren't as nice as that clown man."

weeonion Sat 25-Jul-15 00:48:53 its only 8am and you have had me in floods of tears x 2.

After I graduated I worked in a small independent bookshop for a while. I met some really interesting people while working there. Two incidents stand out from my time there.

1 - it was late afternoon in Nov/Dec when a guy walked in looking stressed and asked for my help. He had befriended a death row prisoner in the US. The prisoner had converted to Islam whilst in prison & had been given a date for his death sentence. The man wanted to read something comforting to the prisoner during their last telephone call. As I happened to be Muslim, I picked out my favourite prayer from the Qur'an in the religious section and ran up to the office and photocopied it for him. He was very grateful and returned a few months later and said his friend was very appreciative of my choice. I didn't need to ask him about his friend, I knew from his face that the sentence had been carried out.

It is the prayer that I would want to hear before I die and it is the prayer I recited to my father just before he died last month.

2- on a more cheerier note but from the same bookshop.
We sold artwork from local artists and there was one of an ornate Moroccan door which I loved &hoped nobody would buy because I wanted to A young David Bowie look a like walked in and asked me about the meaning of the picture, symbolism etc. Me being a complete
simpleton replied that the artist liked the door so that's why he painted it! No mysterious symbolism etc behind it and he still bought the painting. I was gutted but reluctantly happy it was going to an appreciative home!

I was 18 and went to Oxford for an interview and stayed overnight in the halls. I was really nervous, v shy, completely out of my depth and a v young 18. One of the other candidates who was a bit older took me under his wing and we walked round Oxford together, he was so kind and so enthusiastic that it completely turned round those couple of days for me. I didn't get in to the Uni but he really boosted my confidence. Such a lovely thing for him to do, with no strings!

A girl I met while travelling on the trans Siberian, she was American and bright and chatty and v attractive. She met some guys when we were on a stop over in Mongolia who were driving some expensive cars into Russia and she decided to go with them instead of continuing on the train. I often wonder what happened to her, it seemed such a foolhardy thing to do, but she could have had an amazing adventure, I'll never know.

Years ago when I was working in Central London I was walking up Goodge Street when a young lad dressed in a suit probably 18 or so, came charging up crying his eyes out. He was followed shortly by someone who I presume was his manager/boss who was saying something along the lines of come back, let's talk about this.

I often wondered what had happened and what that lad is doing now. He would probably be in his thirties and I always think about him when I'm in that part of London.

Many many many years ago some friends and I went for a long weekend in Amsterdam: one evening we were walking past a bar and a young woman, maybe a couple of years older than us, rode up on her bike and stopped maybe a few feet way from me to talk to some people she knew sitting at a table outside: she had long shiny, wavy black hair, golden olive skin, was wearing a black satin halter neck, tight black satin flared trousers, black sandals and a single red rose behind her ear. The teenage me thought she was the coolest, most effortlessly stylish thing I had ever seen and I've never forgotten that image. Whoever you were lady, just casually riding about on your bike looking like a star, you're still the definition of cool to me!

Ilkely she sounds gorgeous! I had similar in Ibiza in 1989....I was 14 and with my parents...the island was very, very cool...full of gorgeous people. I was walking out with my parents one evening and saw a woman with a blunt black bob haircut and black palazzo pants..she had the loveliest pale skin and red lips...I was mesmerised. She was with two men and I thought "If I could look like her I'd be happy."

I can remember being really ill in hospital with a kidney infection aged 13, my mam couldn't visit for long due to work commitments and caring for my Nana plus the hospital was miles away from where we lived and where she worked was even further away so I told her I would be fine and just to phone when she couldn't make it.

Anyway I remember getting Tietze syndrome on top of the kidney infection which is an inflammation of the cartilage between the ribs and the pain was unbearable.

The hospital I was in at the time didn't have a bed in the childrens ward so I had wound up on a ward with older women. I remember the lady next to me was on oxygen all the time and the woman opposite had dementia and kept screaming get out of my house so the nurse closed my curtain because I got really upset.

Anyway the lady next to me must have heard me crying and she got up out of bed and hugged me till I fell asleep. She was discharged the next day and she left me all her sweets and magazines.

I wish I had got her address to send her a thank you card. Aged 13 though I didn't think about asking as I was too shy.

I've told this story before on here but perfect for this thread. Not me, my sister.

Sister and her boyfriend were travelling through Australia and their camper van broke down, they had no money on them and no phone (15 years ago) A car pulled up, a smartly dressed man got out and towed them to the next town. On the journey, my sister explained the situation and he gave them $200! My sister said they needed his details to pay him back but he said "You'll always be chasing your tail if you pay me back, take the money, I can afford it. Sometimes you need to pass the luck on."

Haven't got a story to share, but just wanted to say that this is probably the loveliest thread I've ever read on Mumsnet.

Oh no wannashed! Sorry for that.

I was 17, an old biker took me for a ride, bought me a dinner and... Took me home. He was quite scary looking, but he was certainly a nice man. I often wonder what he's doing now

Mike was a long-time friend of mine, probably the best friend I have ever had. Like me he was a former foster child and when he died I went to his funeral. There were only ten people at the crematorium but one of them I will always remember. She was young, no more than 20, but when the vicar asked if anybody wanted to speak about Mike's life she was brave enough to do so.
She had lived next to Mike and she told how Mike had befriended her when she had timed out of Care and after she had been placed by the Council in a town where she knew nobody.
After the service was over she got on her bicycle and rode off. I never got to speak to her but I will always wonder how she is managing in her life.

I lobbed at Paris airport as a clueless Aussie backpacker. Bright eyed and excited like a puppy. I started chatting to an older business man at the baggage carousel. He asked where I was staying and I told him and he asked if I knew where it was. I didn't. No idea how to get there, and no, no French at all. He said 'come with me, in my cab, I'll drop you.' So I did.

He gave me his business card when I got out of the cab and told me if I couldn't find my mates (I was due to meet them there), to let him know. This was back in the day before mobile phones and readily accessible email. Then with a wave, off he went.

I was young and clueless and stupid and he was genuinely a nice man, who I think was just imagining his daughter in a similar situation which was why he was so helpful and I never even wrote to him to thank him. I thought about it, but I lost the card. I feel very embarrassed now, when I think about it.

I have 3 DC and sometimes think of the other mums and babies that I shared with in postnatal. I just knew them for maybe 2 nights, on first name basis but we shared so much about one another in that time and saw and supported one another at a very vunerable time. I even remember each baby's name and always think of them on my own DC's birthday.

Lovely thread.

I had the most intense amazing kiss with a guy in a club in Leicester in 1996, no kiss has ever matched it.

Fish I met a few old bikers at that age and they were also total gents. I danced with one in a country pub (full of them) and he threw me around like a rag doll...we did a sort of mad jitterbug which ended with me over his shoulder!

I danced with a truly beautiful man at a disco while I was working as a chambermaid in Switzerland. He only spoke German, but I only speak English, Welsh and French. I occasionally wonder where he is now.