A date in review

A couple years ago, I was telling my friend and coworker Marty some dating stories. He became addicted and started asking me for new stories every week. He suggested I blog about them, but at the time there was someone whose feelings I didn’t want to hurt. That isn’t the case now.

I mentioned before that I’ve been dating. I have a few good leads at any moment, although who they are might change quickly. Friday evening was the first time I had free to meet up with a certain guy. It was a blind internet date – he’s an artist and his emails actually made me laugh even though they were intended to do so. He looked kinda dorky in the photos, but you can’t really tell until you meet someone anyway.

He was like 5 minutes late to 111 Minna (his choice, and a promising one), during which time several other people had asked me if I was the person they were hoping to meet. I started to wonder if the whole city was just a bunch of lonely people trying to meet up, and how is it that it comes to this? The art on the wall was stylisted cartoon images of saints and the seven deadly sins; the deadly sins were interesting but I didn’t understand them. Anyway, he arrived. He was cuter than the photos – actually attractive. He made me laugh almost instantly and continued to do so. It was clear he was pleased with me. He got me a bubble water and himself a tequila sunrise, and we selected a booth to sit and chat.

That’s when the trouble began. We selected a booth, but he sat on my side way too close. I’d known this guy for like 7 minutes at this point. I felt like a girl from the ‘50s angling in the car so that guy can’t put his arm around her. I sat with my back to the wall and my legs on the seat between us, and still he kept scooting towards me every chance he got.

OK, so we’re having pleasant conversation all this time, and he keeps touching me…My leg, my sock, my hair. Guys, if and when I want you to touch me, YOU WILL KNOW. I’ve been on like 30-something internet dates over the years (I find them entertaining from a scientific standpoint), and never, ever have I been in this kind of situation. I felt all the muscles in my body spasm, in a very bad way, as I tried to angle away from this guy, get a little personal space.

That’s really the end of the story: smart, cute, funny, made me laugh, but kept touching me and sat too close. Seeing as we’d known each other for 7 minutes, and he missed all of my physical queues, telling him just didn’t seem worth the confrontation.

We’d met at 5, and usually these things take about an hour. I hoped to get to Critical Mass before it left at about 6:30. But I didn’t get away until closer to 7 – I knew I’d missed the bike ride. So, kinda bummed and with new tension knots in my neck and shoulder, I started riding home in the rain. I stopped at a stop light, and just then, the ride began to pass the other way. As I joined them, I knew my night was saved.

Aren’t happy endings wonderful? If only it were that simple. The things about life is that the only ending is death, and I bet we won’t be assessing our “happy endings” once we’re dead. I got about an hour into the ride when I started to think bad thoughts. So, I went home and watched a movie.