And yet there was always Winston, who would keep me up for hours and hours on the phone, who shared EVERYTHING with me, who was starting to talk about how many kids we’d have…
And I moved out of the sorority house and in with my parents. No quicker way to shoot down the dating life I didn’t have (but still thought I maybe wanted).
And there was Winston, who called me, wrote to me, told me he missed me, thought of me, wanted me to move near him….all the things that were happening (and supposed to be happening) in the romance novel of my brain. And Winston and I talked and talked and talked, and I considered myself one of the luckiest somewhat-single girls ever to have found a man that would talk to me for hours on end and share everything – every single girl’s fantasy.
And Winston came to visit and meet my family. In fact, Winston drove 16 hours, and through a tornado no less, to get to me. I thought I was going to burst with happiness. We played golf, tennis, drank coffee, and almost – so close – kissed on the couch. But, like all good things coming to an end, Winston left. And I cried for days.
But, then one day Winston asked me to move to his city and find a job so that we could be together. Everything was working out just as I had planned! So, I gathered my resources and called in favors, and began talking with people about jobs. And Winston was so supportive. And that should have been a million red flags! No one gets to be this happy and no man is this perfect! (I should know!) And the day when I thought my life was going to go just as I had planned, and my fairy tale was about to come true, Winston, over AOL IM, tells me we need to talk.
I’m not dumb, although I might have been then, but I knew the bomb was about to drop, the earth about to shake, the car about to crash (feel free to add in any other bad analogies here)…I shouldn’t be so morbid, after all, Winston wasn’t the mortician! And Winston announces with gusto (or that’s how I imagined it was happening since it was all online) about how he had met someone. Annie. And I would LOVE her.
WHAT THE HELL?! How am I going to love the woman that had stolen my man? Okay, well, he wasn’t exactly my man, I mean, we weren’t dating, but for crying out loud, we had our honeymoon planned!
Annie. And was I terribly upset, he wanted to know. Me, upset? NO! I cried for a week, I couldn’t go back to work (uh yeah, smart boy told me this on my freaking lunch hour at work!), I was devastated. But wait, this isn’t how it works out in the movies, the beautiful girl (yeah, that’s me) always gets the handsome prince (okay, balding a little, but we aren’t getting any younger!).
And in my twisted girl-like world, I held out hope that he would come back to me. Back to me? He wasn’t ever really with me. Or at least I know that now.
And a little over a year later, on Thanksgiving, after almost 8 months of not talking to him and no contact (both of our doing, not just his, although mostly mine), I get a phone message. “you may or may not have heard but Annie and I got married.” Holy *&^%. He did what? And I’m supposed to be thankful for this on Thanksgiving? How about an emotional mess?? And who would I have heard that from? Uh, let’s think here Winston. So much for my happy, fairy tale ending. And the space ship came crashing back to earth.
And, a year later (or maybe it was two...I mean, it WAS fairly traumatic), I had finally recovered, and committed my life to moving on from him. Although I sure wasn’t dating. I mean, how could I?
Yeah, no bitterness here.
Saturday, August 22, 2009
Monday, August 17, 2009
A Side of Granola and Playing with Dead People
Until, of course, DJ came to visit. DJ was a college friend who embodied everything I was not – totally granola, spontaneous, unorganized, unkempt, didn’t need a stable job…great guy. Don’t they say opposites attract? DJ showed up at my door with some other college friends the night the sorority girls were having a sex toy party. DJ led a fairly sheltered life, where as my eyes had been opened to all kinds of, uh, sorority house antics. I probably looked horrified as DJ asked one of the girls to tell him about sex toys. Uh, yeah. DJ and I had a great weekend with our college friends. He even broke my bed. Wait a second…DRAG YOUR MIND OUT OF THE GUTTER!! He was trying to be funny and took a flying leap, only to find out that my bed was older than dirt, and in a big crash, the only thing collapsed to the ground. After the initial shock wore off, it was kind of funny.
Anyway, DJ came and went and still Winston was in the back of my mind. Always there, like it was meant to be. Or something.
Oh, and speaking of something, let’s not forget about Morty. Okay, so Morty isn’t his real name, but since I’m attempting anonymity, what else do you call a mortician? Yes, he was a mortician. He played with dead people. Formaldehyde, caskets, funeral parlors…the life every girl dreams of. Morty was (well, I guess he still technically is since he hasn’t died yet!) the cousin of a friend and everyone’s favorite mortician. Only problem – I couldn’t seem to bring myself into my ‘hood and avoid long distance dating. Morty lived a good 8 hours away. Morty and I were going to read the classics together…The Odyssey, David Copperfield, all the classics I had vowed to read by my 30th birthday. (FYI – 30 is rapidly approaching and I’m nowhere near that goal!) And just like that, Morty shot and killed any hope of a relationship…and buried it in the ground…okay, no more mortuary jokes.
And the vow happened again – no more dating! And there I was, only 23!
Anyway, DJ came and went and still Winston was in the back of my mind. Always there, like it was meant to be. Or something.
Oh, and speaking of something, let’s not forget about Morty. Okay, so Morty isn’t his real name, but since I’m attempting anonymity, what else do you call a mortician? Yes, he was a mortician. He played with dead people. Formaldehyde, caskets, funeral parlors…the life every girl dreams of. Morty was (well, I guess he still technically is since he hasn’t died yet!) the cousin of a friend and everyone’s favorite mortician. Only problem – I couldn’t seem to bring myself into my ‘hood and avoid long distance dating. Morty lived a good 8 hours away. Morty and I were going to read the classics together…The Odyssey, David Copperfield, all the classics I had vowed to read by my 30th birthday. (FYI – 30 is rapidly approaching and I’m nowhere near that goal!) And just like that, Morty shot and killed any hope of a relationship…and buried it in the ground…okay, no more mortuary jokes.
And the vow happened again – no more dating! And there I was, only 23!
Sunday, August 16, 2009
The Man of my Dreams and Tampon Boy
When it all started, I was already in love, alone and in love apparently, but in love all the same. I had met the man of my dreams while following my passion of traveling the world. It was going to be the perfect story – regular girl travels to foreign country, meets wonderful boy, is swept off her feet and lives happily ever after. Except that happily ever after wasn’t ever and certainly wasn’t after, or even happily for that matter.
I met Winston, as we shall call him, while I was in a foreign country. I was immediately smitten, and for crying out loud, he gave that aura off too. Lesson #1: Never trust the aura! So, when Winston and I both went back to our respective locations, I was convinced that this was just another side bar in the happy story of our soon-to-be-happy lives.
And that’s where Tampon Boy comes in. It was several years after meeting Winston. There was plenty of long distance swooning, but then again, I suppose it’s always easier when there’s half a continent between my flaws and his. It was about this time that my mother decided that I needed to date. Ah dating. I had successfully made it through college with a degree or two, or in my case three, and had managed to avoid the marriage trap that my friends seem to have fallen victim to…something like lemmings jumping off a cliff. And I was happy. I had a crazy job and was starting to make friends again in my hometown in my post-college life.
It wasn’t that I was wishing for the date to go badly. But then again, maybe I was. After all, I was in love with Winston. Tampon Boy (hence forth referred to as T.B.) started out okay. Well, maybe not. He was late picking me up. Tardiness is not an attractive quality. But I was nervous, so I could overlook some of those things. It started out innocently enough, although I had a few doubts about T.B., since it took him an hour to drive us to a restaurant that was 10 minutes away, but whatever. All doubts quickly turned to “get me the heck out of here!” shortly into our dinner.
Dinner conversation usually starts out innocently enough, but it was not too far into eating my pasta when I was praying for the floor to open up and swallow me whole. In the course of our conversation, if you can call it that, we started talking about plumbing. It was a relevant topic, given that I had just taken apart a sink that morning to dig out a retainer…sorority girls – that’s all you need to know. And yet, in the process of talking about sinks, the topic of tampons came up. And not because I brought it up. I have never, in my life, met a man, a MAN, that can monologue for a solid hour and a half about the hazards of flushing tampons in a house full of sorority girls. The expansion, the blockage, the plunger, everything I could ever want to know and then some, and most of it I didn’t even want to know. I mean seriously, I don’t even know any females that can talk that long about tampons. As I sat eating my garlic pasta (don’t be shocked, I knew then and there that there would be NO kissing!!), I silently begged and pleaded for an earthquake, a tsunami, a mudslide, anything to make the conversation stop. No luck in my landlocked city.
Now imagine me sitting there, during all of this. And imagine the table directly to my left with six transvestites (okay, so I’m pretty sure they were just flamboyantly gay men, but the story has snowballed in my head over the years), pointing and laughing hysterically as I try to sink in my chair and T.B. continues his soliloquy on tampons. You know it’s bad when the whole restaurant stops to listen.
But then fun didn’t end there. After we finally left dinner, T.B. announced that we were stopping by his friend’s birthday party. Wahoo…a bowling alley full of people that I don’t know while I’m on a blind date that just involved a tampon monologue. But, as I have learned from my life of dating (and dating and dating and dating), I went along with the plan to prove that I was not one of “those” girls. At the bowling alley, the evening revolves around a toilet seat. I apparently had my own group of friends that must be fairly boring and uncreative because I had never received a toilet seat as a birthday card. I walk in with T.B. and am handed a Sharpie and a toilet seat and told to sign. And what do you write to a complete stranger? “Shit Happens. Happy Birthday” or “Holy Shit, it’s your birthday” or “Crap, another year older”…my list could have gone on forever. Okay, so I seriously didn’t write anything like that, but if I knew then what I know now, I might have. So while T.B. goes to bowl a game with his friends, I get the third degree from some guy…where is my relationship with T.B. going, where do I see our relationship in five years….etc, etc, etc. How about clogging up the toilet just like those tampons?! And after that, I was pretty much done. The night ended with an awkward hug in a house full of sorority girls watching my ever move.
So memorable, was I, in fact, that several weeks later when a mutual friend (whom I am no longer friends with) asked T.B. about our date, he didn’t even remember who I was! Think tampons, my friend!
Nicely done, mom!
And thus, I made a vow not to date again, for a long time.
I met Winston, as we shall call him, while I was in a foreign country. I was immediately smitten, and for crying out loud, he gave that aura off too. Lesson #1: Never trust the aura! So, when Winston and I both went back to our respective locations, I was convinced that this was just another side bar in the happy story of our soon-to-be-happy lives.
And that’s where Tampon Boy comes in. It was several years after meeting Winston. There was plenty of long distance swooning, but then again, I suppose it’s always easier when there’s half a continent between my flaws and his. It was about this time that my mother decided that I needed to date. Ah dating. I had successfully made it through college with a degree or two, or in my case three, and had managed to avoid the marriage trap that my friends seem to have fallen victim to…something like lemmings jumping off a cliff. And I was happy. I had a crazy job and was starting to make friends again in my hometown in my post-college life.
It wasn’t that I was wishing for the date to go badly. But then again, maybe I was. After all, I was in love with Winston. Tampon Boy (hence forth referred to as T.B.) started out okay. Well, maybe not. He was late picking me up. Tardiness is not an attractive quality. But I was nervous, so I could overlook some of those things. It started out innocently enough, although I had a few doubts about T.B., since it took him an hour to drive us to a restaurant that was 10 minutes away, but whatever. All doubts quickly turned to “get me the heck out of here!” shortly into our dinner.
Dinner conversation usually starts out innocently enough, but it was not too far into eating my pasta when I was praying for the floor to open up and swallow me whole. In the course of our conversation, if you can call it that, we started talking about plumbing. It was a relevant topic, given that I had just taken apart a sink that morning to dig out a retainer…sorority girls – that’s all you need to know. And yet, in the process of talking about sinks, the topic of tampons came up. And not because I brought it up. I have never, in my life, met a man, a MAN, that can monologue for a solid hour and a half about the hazards of flushing tampons in a house full of sorority girls. The expansion, the blockage, the plunger, everything I could ever want to know and then some, and most of it I didn’t even want to know. I mean seriously, I don’t even know any females that can talk that long about tampons. As I sat eating my garlic pasta (don’t be shocked, I knew then and there that there would be NO kissing!!), I silently begged and pleaded for an earthquake, a tsunami, a mudslide, anything to make the conversation stop. No luck in my landlocked city.
Now imagine me sitting there, during all of this. And imagine the table directly to my left with six transvestites (okay, so I’m pretty sure they were just flamboyantly gay men, but the story has snowballed in my head over the years), pointing and laughing hysterically as I try to sink in my chair and T.B. continues his soliloquy on tampons. You know it’s bad when the whole restaurant stops to listen.
But then fun didn’t end there. After we finally left dinner, T.B. announced that we were stopping by his friend’s birthday party. Wahoo…a bowling alley full of people that I don’t know while I’m on a blind date that just involved a tampon monologue. But, as I have learned from my life of dating (and dating and dating and dating), I went along with the plan to prove that I was not one of “those” girls. At the bowling alley, the evening revolves around a toilet seat. I apparently had my own group of friends that must be fairly boring and uncreative because I had never received a toilet seat as a birthday card. I walk in with T.B. and am handed a Sharpie and a toilet seat and told to sign. And what do you write to a complete stranger? “Shit Happens. Happy Birthday” or “Holy Shit, it’s your birthday” or “Crap, another year older”…my list could have gone on forever. Okay, so I seriously didn’t write anything like that, but if I knew then what I know now, I might have. So while T.B. goes to bowl a game with his friends, I get the third degree from some guy…where is my relationship with T.B. going, where do I see our relationship in five years….etc, etc, etc. How about clogging up the toilet just like those tampons?! And after that, I was pretty much done. The night ended with an awkward hug in a house full of sorority girls watching my ever move.
So memorable, was I, in fact, that several weeks later when a mutual friend (whom I am no longer friends with) asked T.B. about our date, he didn’t even remember who I was! Think tampons, my friend!
Nicely done, mom!
And thus, I made a vow not to date again, for a long time.
How it All Began
I never started out intending to be one of those girls, full of stories of crazy dating escapades. I always thought that I would have a fairly normal life...date a little, meet Prince Charming, get married, have kids, and get old. I had NO idea that things would come to this. Post-college, I have been told a million times that I should be writing a book about some of the bad dates that I've been on. At first I didn't think any of my stories would be worth reading. But, the older I've gotten and the more bad dates I've been on, the more I felt the need to communicate with the world that there are a lot of freaks and weirdos out there. And yes, even my own version of Mr. T. As I was sharing these stories with a friend one day, it dawned on me that she had me beat in only one category: I have never dated an ex-con. Don't get me wrong, I'm quite certain I've dated men with a police record, and that wouldn't surprise me in the least, but to the best of my knowledge, none have ever spent any time in prison...yet. In any case, I am finally doing what I should have started years ago: chronicling my totally true tales as a twenty-something dater. I hope you'll read these, share your stories with me, and get a laugh out of all the interesting people that have fallen into the lap of just another single girl looking for love!
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