Just before midday Lucy saw a large shoal of fishes grazing on the weed. They were all eating steadily and all moving in the same direction. “Just like a flock of sheep,” thought Lucy. Suddenly she saw a little Sea Girl of about her own age in the middle of them—a quiet, lonely-looking girl with a sort of crook in her hand. Lucy felt sure that this girl must be a shepherdess—or perhaps a fish-herdess—and that the shoal was really a flock at pasture. Both the fishes and the girl were quite close to the surface. And just as the girl, gliding in the shallow water, and Lucy, leaning over the bulwark, came opposite to one another, the girl looked up and stared straight into Lucy’s face. Neither could speak to the other and in a moment the Sea Girl dropped astern. But Lucy will never forget her face. It did not look frightened or angry like those of the other Sea People. Lucy had liked that girl and she felt certain the girl had liked her. In that one moment they had somehow become friends. There does not seem to be much chance of their meeting again in that world or any other. But if ever they do they will rush together with their hands held out.

— CS Lewis, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

Have you ever passed someone on the street, or in a train or a bus, and made a momentary connection—smiling at them, or saying hello, or stopping for a chat, and you just know that you would get on really well with that person if you ever became friends?

When this happens, it reminds me of the story of Lucy and the Narnian sea shepherdess in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader.

I was in a queue for the passport check at Heathrow and got chatting with a lovely lady originally from Mauritius. Partway through the conversation I noticed that our passport photos looked quite similar. So she said I was “a sister from another mister” which was lovely.

Last night we were in a restaurant and a lady and I smiled at each other and it again reminded me of Lucy and the sea shepherdess, and I came up with a name for these encounters, “mermaid moments”.