(Originally published 1/31/2008)
A boy I had just begun seeing decided to join me back home in Memphis for New Year’s Eve. My mother, of course, wanted to meet the latest in my long line of husbands, so she cooked dinner and invited other relatives over to visit. The dinner was rather uneventful, thankfully, and at some point afterwards Kevin and I decided that we were going to sneak away to meet up with some old friends of mine for a few drinks.
As I left the room to refresh myself before heading out, I announced that I was going to get ready, to which Kevin quipped, "See you in a few hours." To my utter confusion, his response got a huge laugh out of the room full of my relatives. I turned from the bottom stair, asking no one in particular just what that was supposed to mean. "I don’t take long to get ready," I said defensively, to which they all laughed even harder. "Whatever," I huffed, leaving the room. A few hours later, we left the house.
This hadn’t sat well with me. And I brought it up later that night over cocktails with friends of mine whom I’ve known for at least fifteen years, to which they all agreed that, yes, I take forever to get ready. My frustration didn’t lie in the fact that I may or may not need more time prepping myself than an Oscar nominee on an award night. I couldn’t care less that it has taken me upwards of an hour and a half before to prepare myself for the grocery store. What bothered me was the subtle realization that came along with having others point this out to me.
Something that was openly flawed about me had never even occurred to me. And how many other terrible things about myself that I’d never dreamt to consider were out there? Besides the laundry list of things wrong with myself that typically mull over and dissect like a scientist, what else was there?
The next morning I was discussing with my mother how I believed that Kevin and I were a good match, trying to relate his low-key, no-frills demeanor to my own personality. "We’re both just very laid back and low maintenance," I said. My mother stared alarmingly into my eyes and asked me to repeat myself. When I did, she reached out for my hand and, staring with elevated concern into my eyes, told me, "No, son, you are not. There is nothing low key or low maintenance about you. Whatsoever. At all!"
And with that, I was in crisis mode. How could someone as so self-identified as myself, so certain of their own lot in life and the things that they can and cannot do, be so blatantly wrong about any aspect of their own personality? There are things that I cannot do, things of which I’ve been comfortably aware all of my adult life. I cannot tolerate Gloria Estefan. I cannot save money. I cannot say no to a cute boy. Such things are core to who I am as a person. And the things that I can do I’ve always been certain of as well, like make people laugh, or find traces of reason within confusion, or drink eight pitchers of beer and still know where I parked the car. Being self-aware had always been my thing. I knew myself inside and out. I was never the one to apologize for who I was, what I believed in, or what I wanted. I was a woman coming of age in a Lifetime movie even as a teenager.
And with that self-awareness had always been the assumption that I was as cool as a cucumber, as chill and relaxed as the guy I bought my weed from in college. Am I not the guy that just tosses on a ball cap and heads to Starbucks? Aren’t I the dude that lounges in the background, never causing a fuss? I’m the guy who’s cool leaving the house without a belt, the guy who doesn’t floss his teeth everyday, the guy who wears tee-shirts he got for free at the car wash. Aren’t I?
I was reminded of my friend Katie who, all through high school and college, described herself as an "outdoorsy" girl. Despite having never been in any tent but a beer tent at a music festival, Katie truly believed that at her core, she was Jane Goodall. This attracted all sorts of men to her, such as athletes, granola boys, and the rocker-types, all of which were turned on by her ability to "rough it," to lay back and be "one of the guys." It was bound to eventually happen. And one day one of Katie’s suitors took her up on one such camping trip, outdoors. They slept under the stars and went mountain biking. Katie even urinated in the bushes. But when the weekend came to a sweaty, non-tooth-brushed end, Katie booked five days at the spa and now won’t even agree to attend an outdoor barbeque.
So, just as Katie was forced to reevaluate who she thought she was, that day staring into a mirror at the image of her unshowered self, her hair matted to the side of her greasy face, I too needed to come to terms with who I actually was versus who I had always claimed to be. And after a dozen or so last-minute opinions from other friends, all of whom agreed with my mother that I was anything but low-key and low-maintenance, I began to adjust to my changing self-image. Big deal if I’d let slip past me aspects of my personality that were less than appealing. Weren’t there enough parts I adored about myself to more than make up for these newly discovered personal flaws. I thought so.
And since I had to be somewhere in four hours and needed to get ready, I quickly adapted to the new high-strung impossibly spoiled brat that I’d always been and went about my aware, self-examined day.
Thursday, November 6, 2008
Shop and compare!
(Originally published 8/30/2007)
I had a long and lustrous career as a food server before stumbling into Recruitment. I waited tables off and on for almost 10 years before settling into this profession. Waiting tables was something I was good at due to my bizarre talent of remembering tedious information. My brain nurtures facts that most of society would deem meaningless, like knowing the name of every Real World cast member, and rejects things that might someday come in useful, like my mother’s birthday or where I parked my car.
I worked for most of the major restaurant chains during this period in my life. I’ve served hot wings at Applebee’s to starving hillbillies in sweat-stained wife-beaters. I’ve delivered Chili’s Top Shelf Margaritas to countless tables of feisty mean-spirited ghetto princesses. Due to my god-given nature of not really giving a f*ck about anything, in dangerous combination with a temper that at times can make Bobby Knight look like he’s on Valium, I was fired from most of these places, managers citing various incidences of my having thrown money or swore at people. Once I even put a cigarette out in someone’s desert. But I digress. C’est la vie.
Once while working at a Spaghetti Warehouse in Memphis, I was summonsed to the manager’s office to discuss my behavior towards a "Secret Shopper" table. A Secret Shopper, apparently, was someone planted in the restaurant by management to critique my every move and decide based on my performance as to whether or not they would return to the restaurant or suggest us to their friends. Needless to say, I let my employers down. But what struck me as odd was this whole concept of secretly shopping, this idea of physically coming in to the restaurant to eat only to sit there and form commentary as opposed to enjoying yourself. What an intriguing yet deceitful maneuver! As the waiter, they had me convinced that they had already made up their minds about where they wanted to eat, yet in their heads swam doubt and judgment about everything from the drink order to dropping off the check. Would I have performed better had I known all along that they were fully distracted by the other choices of restaurants that they had? You bet! That whole experience left me feeling as if someone had been spying on me. Being measured against someone else is absolutely no fun when you have no idea that there is even a competition going on.
I revisited this subtle feeling of betrayal recently when talking to my friend Hector about a guy who took an entire 5 days to respond to an email I had sent. Already having written the guy off, Hector sympathized with him, telling me that maybe he was busy or simply playing by the "rules" that you never respond with any efficiency in the beginning stages of a potential relationship. Bullsh*t, I decided. Skeptical and still a bit angry over my very recent dating history, seemingly ill-fated to saddle up only with guys that like to keep their options open (unbeknownst to me), I decided that Mr. 5 Day Email Response was a Secret Shopper!
Now, the concept of the Secret Shopper is like the agenda of the Republican party. It’s subtle, basically invisible, and doesn’t make its presence known until it’s absolutely impossible to right that wrong. Just because someone has bellied up to the bar beside you, or invited you to dinner, or even having done something as simple as picked up the phone to call you, this doesn’t mean that this person’s mind is made up. They are constantly keeping score on mental ratings cards. They are placing values between 1 and 5 (1 being absolutely disgusting and 5 being above exception) on everything you do. In what you say, what you wear, who you know, where you live, tallies are being kept. Values are being placed on everything about you so that that person can go home and stack your performance against those of your competitors.
What makes this such an outrage to me is the simple fact that I, based on someone merely agreeing to hang out with me, forget that the whole world of dating is a capitalistic, competitive fight to the death. I forget that there are MANY people out there who do actually eat at the Spaghetti Warehouse for the roundabout assurance that they would definitely rather be eating at Applebee’s. I don’t quite understand this. When I want something, I go get it. If I’m craving Starbucks I don’t go to Jamba Juice just to prove to myself how much I did actually want Starbucks. And I certainly wouldn’t waste the good people at Jamba Juice’s time because of my retarded logic behind ever making up my mind.
I realize that the paranoia surrounding everyone out there in the dating world being Secret Shoppers is the last stop on the train to being a card-carrying spinster, but I don’t care. I rather like the idea of being guarded, of planning every new relationship to last only until the guy hops back on Myspace. Because I know what I’m worth. And they’re not going to get anything like this anywhere else in town. So happy shopping, jerks.
I had a long and lustrous career as a food server before stumbling into Recruitment. I waited tables off and on for almost 10 years before settling into this profession. Waiting tables was something I was good at due to my bizarre talent of remembering tedious information. My brain nurtures facts that most of society would deem meaningless, like knowing the name of every Real World cast member, and rejects things that might someday come in useful, like my mother’s birthday or where I parked my car.
I worked for most of the major restaurant chains during this period in my life. I’ve served hot wings at Applebee’s to starving hillbillies in sweat-stained wife-beaters. I’ve delivered Chili’s Top Shelf Margaritas to countless tables of feisty mean-spirited ghetto princesses. Due to my god-given nature of not really giving a f*ck about anything, in dangerous combination with a temper that at times can make Bobby Knight look like he’s on Valium, I was fired from most of these places, managers citing various incidences of my having thrown money or swore at people. Once I even put a cigarette out in someone’s desert. But I digress. C’est la vie.
Once while working at a Spaghetti Warehouse in Memphis, I was summonsed to the manager’s office to discuss my behavior towards a "Secret Shopper" table. A Secret Shopper, apparently, was someone planted in the restaurant by management to critique my every move and decide based on my performance as to whether or not they would return to the restaurant or suggest us to their friends. Needless to say, I let my employers down. But what struck me as odd was this whole concept of secretly shopping, this idea of physically coming in to the restaurant to eat only to sit there and form commentary as opposed to enjoying yourself. What an intriguing yet deceitful maneuver! As the waiter, they had me convinced that they had already made up their minds about where they wanted to eat, yet in their heads swam doubt and judgment about everything from the drink order to dropping off the check. Would I have performed better had I known all along that they were fully distracted by the other choices of restaurants that they had? You bet! That whole experience left me feeling as if someone had been spying on me. Being measured against someone else is absolutely no fun when you have no idea that there is even a competition going on.
I revisited this subtle feeling of betrayal recently when talking to my friend Hector about a guy who took an entire 5 days to respond to an email I had sent. Already having written the guy off, Hector sympathized with him, telling me that maybe he was busy or simply playing by the "rules" that you never respond with any efficiency in the beginning stages of a potential relationship. Bullsh*t, I decided. Skeptical and still a bit angry over my very recent dating history, seemingly ill-fated to saddle up only with guys that like to keep their options open (unbeknownst to me), I decided that Mr. 5 Day Email Response was a Secret Shopper!
Now, the concept of the Secret Shopper is like the agenda of the Republican party. It’s subtle, basically invisible, and doesn’t make its presence known until it’s absolutely impossible to right that wrong. Just because someone has bellied up to the bar beside you, or invited you to dinner, or even having done something as simple as picked up the phone to call you, this doesn’t mean that this person’s mind is made up. They are constantly keeping score on mental ratings cards. They are placing values between 1 and 5 (1 being absolutely disgusting and 5 being above exception) on everything you do. In what you say, what you wear, who you know, where you live, tallies are being kept. Values are being placed on everything about you so that that person can go home and stack your performance against those of your competitors.
What makes this such an outrage to me is the simple fact that I, based on someone merely agreeing to hang out with me, forget that the whole world of dating is a capitalistic, competitive fight to the death. I forget that there are MANY people out there who do actually eat at the Spaghetti Warehouse for the roundabout assurance that they would definitely rather be eating at Applebee’s. I don’t quite understand this. When I want something, I go get it. If I’m craving Starbucks I don’t go to Jamba Juice just to prove to myself how much I did actually want Starbucks. And I certainly wouldn’t waste the good people at Jamba Juice’s time because of my retarded logic behind ever making up my mind.
I realize that the paranoia surrounding everyone out there in the dating world being Secret Shoppers is the last stop on the train to being a card-carrying spinster, but I don’t care. I rather like the idea of being guarded, of planning every new relationship to last only until the guy hops back on Myspace. Because I know what I’m worth. And they’re not going to get anything like this anywhere else in town. So happy shopping, jerks.
You don't know me!
(Originally published 3/3/2007)
Recently I received an email from a friend of mine inviting me over to play board games. Being single, I immediately scrolled through the addresses of the other recipients scrounging for either the names of other single people or the names of people that I don’t know (who may very well turn out to be single). However, I was the only person listed without a significant other. I wasn’t sure what I was expected to do if any of the games involved teams. Was I supposed to take them all on like Bruce Lee would a pack of wild ninjas? Perhaps he had only invited me to make sure the salsa stayed fresh or in case someone needed to go out for more ice.
When I asked him about it, why he would invite only a slew of couples and me, pouring You’ll-Never-Get-Married brand salt in my wounds of eternal bachelorhood, he laughed. "You have a different boyfriend every week," he said, "I knew you’d have a date."
What on earth could that have meant? I was dumbfounded. Was he referring to me, the guy who thinks that every lonely country song was written just for him? The guy who wants to take his own life in the cereal aisle at the grocery store when he sees married people bickering over how many boxies of Wheaties to buy? How could such a reputation have been bestowed upon me when no one has bought me anything for Valentine’s Day since Bill Clinton was in office?
"Think about it," he asked of me, "how many guys have you dated just this year?"
Well, this would be easy, I thought. We were barely into the third month of 2007. There was the diabetic, the 22 year old, the flight attendant, the architect, the older guy who lived two blocks over from me… Now even I was confused.
Then my friend Rebecca repeated his sentiment the next day in a phone conversation, telling me that I had dated more people in the past few months than some of her single straight friends had in ten years. Just because you’re going to Tiffany’s everyday, I told her, doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re buying anything.
But I wondered how this could’ve happened, how one version of myself could exist so solidly in my own mind but another completely opposite version of myself was bumping around Chicago mixing and mingling with every cute boy in a pair of Diesels. Obviously a case of volume over quality, but at what point had I taken on the gambler’s philosophy, that all I had to do was keep playing, no matter how deep in the hole I had become, and eventually I was bound to strike it rich? Statistically I was bound to meet someone with which I shared a mutual, healthy connection. And this could happen with the very next roll of the dice! Right?
I remembered a pact I had made with myself when I turned 30. I did what most people do when they reach a milestone, I took stock. What exactly, I had asked myself, do I want out of life? I had admitted to myself then and there that one of the things I seriously wanted was to someday be married and the best way to achieve such a goal without too drastically altering my behavior was to be more assertive when it came to finding dates, meaning that if I’m in a bar, which I often am, and someone looks at me long enough to catch my attention, I will talk to them. If we talk long enough, I will call them. If I call them and they call me back, I will go out on a date with them. If they don’t have a collection of severed heads in their refrigerator and they think I’m funny, I will go out with them twice.
And apparently twice is the magic number that defines "dating," and so my friends’ observations of me began to make sense. I honestly never felt as if I was dating anyone. I was just putting myself out there, feeling like a circle that ran from square to square hoping that we’d fit. Keeping your dance card full is no easy task for a guy like me. I am not your typical gay man. I am not graceful or mysterious or exotic. I am not wealthy or charming or well-connected. I wouldn’t know a work of art if it fell out of the sky and landed on my bald head, but I can tell you where in a Wal-Mart store you would find the Drano. So the idea of me being the type of guy that has every cute boy within earshot wanting to date me is both flattering and offensive. Flattering to me, offensive to them.
There’s a feeling of solitude that comes over you when people in your life reveal to you an alternate version of yourself. It’s like having a conversation with a Republican about September 11th in relationship to The War in Iraq. Although both sides have seen the exact same things, two completely different versions of the truth exist. Despite the facts, despite this having been an overactive year for me, despite me having at least a hundred names programmed into my cell phone who I can no longer identify, I don’t feel like what the kids would call a "player." I still feel like the lead in some single female empowering television series along the lines of "Sex and the City" or "Ally McBeal." Aren’t I the smart and quiet and lonely person who goes home to a quiet house and watches old black and white movies in my pajamas? Or am I what my friends all see me as, the wild non-committal sex maniac who has issues being by himself?
Am I Mary Tyler Moore or Susan Lucci?
It could be possible that I’m both. And I suppose that would be OK. A lesson I was fortunate enough to learn at an early age is that it doesn’t really matter how contradictory your opinion of yourself is versus the opinions of others, as long as you like yourself. And either way, whether I’m at home reading a book alone in bed or trying to make the moves on some smoking hot dude in a bar, I’m just fine with myself, whatever version of myself is out there. It’s a win - win situation. Because I like me.
And so does the hairdresser, and the attorney, and the cartoonist, and the guy in Accounting…
Recently I received an email from a friend of mine inviting me over to play board games. Being single, I immediately scrolled through the addresses of the other recipients scrounging for either the names of other single people or the names of people that I don’t know (who may very well turn out to be single). However, I was the only person listed without a significant other. I wasn’t sure what I was expected to do if any of the games involved teams. Was I supposed to take them all on like Bruce Lee would a pack of wild ninjas? Perhaps he had only invited me to make sure the salsa stayed fresh or in case someone needed to go out for more ice.
When I asked him about it, why he would invite only a slew of couples and me, pouring You’ll-Never-Get-Married brand salt in my wounds of eternal bachelorhood, he laughed. "You have a different boyfriend every week," he said, "I knew you’d have a date."
What on earth could that have meant? I was dumbfounded. Was he referring to me, the guy who thinks that every lonely country song was written just for him? The guy who wants to take his own life in the cereal aisle at the grocery store when he sees married people bickering over how many boxies of Wheaties to buy? How could such a reputation have been bestowed upon me when no one has bought me anything for Valentine’s Day since Bill Clinton was in office?
"Think about it," he asked of me, "how many guys have you dated just this year?"
Well, this would be easy, I thought. We were barely into the third month of 2007. There was the diabetic, the 22 year old, the flight attendant, the architect, the older guy who lived two blocks over from me… Now even I was confused.
Then my friend Rebecca repeated his sentiment the next day in a phone conversation, telling me that I had dated more people in the past few months than some of her single straight friends had in ten years. Just because you’re going to Tiffany’s everyday, I told her, doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re buying anything.
But I wondered how this could’ve happened, how one version of myself could exist so solidly in my own mind but another completely opposite version of myself was bumping around Chicago mixing and mingling with every cute boy in a pair of Diesels. Obviously a case of volume over quality, but at what point had I taken on the gambler’s philosophy, that all I had to do was keep playing, no matter how deep in the hole I had become, and eventually I was bound to strike it rich? Statistically I was bound to meet someone with which I shared a mutual, healthy connection. And this could happen with the very next roll of the dice! Right?
I remembered a pact I had made with myself when I turned 30. I did what most people do when they reach a milestone, I took stock. What exactly, I had asked myself, do I want out of life? I had admitted to myself then and there that one of the things I seriously wanted was to someday be married and the best way to achieve such a goal without too drastically altering my behavior was to be more assertive when it came to finding dates, meaning that if I’m in a bar, which I often am, and someone looks at me long enough to catch my attention, I will talk to them. If we talk long enough, I will call them. If I call them and they call me back, I will go out on a date with them. If they don’t have a collection of severed heads in their refrigerator and they think I’m funny, I will go out with them twice.
And apparently twice is the magic number that defines "dating," and so my friends’ observations of me began to make sense. I honestly never felt as if I was dating anyone. I was just putting myself out there, feeling like a circle that ran from square to square hoping that we’d fit. Keeping your dance card full is no easy task for a guy like me. I am not your typical gay man. I am not graceful or mysterious or exotic. I am not wealthy or charming or well-connected. I wouldn’t know a work of art if it fell out of the sky and landed on my bald head, but I can tell you where in a Wal-Mart store you would find the Drano. So the idea of me being the type of guy that has every cute boy within earshot wanting to date me is both flattering and offensive. Flattering to me, offensive to them.
There’s a feeling of solitude that comes over you when people in your life reveal to you an alternate version of yourself. It’s like having a conversation with a Republican about September 11th in relationship to The War in Iraq. Although both sides have seen the exact same things, two completely different versions of the truth exist. Despite the facts, despite this having been an overactive year for me, despite me having at least a hundred names programmed into my cell phone who I can no longer identify, I don’t feel like what the kids would call a "player." I still feel like the lead in some single female empowering television series along the lines of "Sex and the City" or "Ally McBeal." Aren’t I the smart and quiet and lonely person who goes home to a quiet house and watches old black and white movies in my pajamas? Or am I what my friends all see me as, the wild non-committal sex maniac who has issues being by himself?
Am I Mary Tyler Moore or Susan Lucci?
It could be possible that I’m both. And I suppose that would be OK. A lesson I was fortunate enough to learn at an early age is that it doesn’t really matter how contradictory your opinion of yourself is versus the opinions of others, as long as you like yourself. And either way, whether I’m at home reading a book alone in bed or trying to make the moves on some smoking hot dude in a bar, I’m just fine with myself, whatever version of myself is out there. It’s a win - win situation. Because I like me.
And so does the hairdresser, and the attorney, and the cartoonist, and the guy in Accounting…
Birds do it. Bees do it.
(Originally published 1/16/2007)
When I was growing up my uncle had a big bird dog named Bo. I’m not sure how Bo came to live with my uncle’s family, Bo having been raised and trained as a bird dog, and my uncle, who didn’t even hunt, living on half an acre in the suburbs. Needless to say, Bo was wild and not meant for a life confined in a tiny backyard. Bo was not the type of dog any of us kids wanted to play with. He was strong, hyper, dominating, constantly in motion. A visit into the backyard would certainly end with Bo tackling you to the ground. He escaped from their fenced-in backyard on many occassions, having seen a bird or a squirl on the other side, and was strong enough to barrel through the wooden fence like the Kool-Aid man. Bo was a force of nature not to be reckoned with.
Until one day my uncle came home with an electronic shock device that he placed around Bo’s neck. The thing on Bo’s neck would send shocks through him everytime he got too close to the fence. I had the misfortune of seeeing how Bo adapted to that shock collar. He stood still long enough for my uncle to strap it on his neck, then made his usual dash towards the fence. With a yelp that was heard all through the neighborhood, Bo’s life as a hunter ended. He spent the remainder of his days calm, subdued, one solid lesson learned and adapted to. Bo never got near that fence again.
Despite animals being of a lesser intellect, despite the fact that most animal species have been known to eat their own sh*t, they are something to be admired for their instant understanding of danger and harm. If a bird sees another bird eat a berry and then that bird drops dead, the other bird makes a mental note to itself, "don’t ever eat those berries." If a mouse knows that there is a certain area of the woods where being eaten up by an owl is a real threat, the mouse avoids that area. You don’t have to tell an animal twice. This may kill you. This may hurt like hell.
But not human beings. I’ve woken up almost every Sunday morning for the past fifteen years with a vicious hangover. Yet every Saturday night I’m right back on that track towards harm, ordering round after round of drinks with about a dozen cigarettes sprinkled in between. I know that I’m going to feel like I was run over by a tractor the next morning, but I don’t stop. And we all do that to some degree. We eat food that we know will make us fat or sick. We buy things that we probably can’t afford. And the biggest thing we do that no self-respecting animal would ever do, we walk willingly into situations where we know our hearts will break.
My mind wondered towards that bird dog Bo recently as I laid on the couch in my underwear, recently dumped, mulling over in my mind every blatant indication that I was not going to walk away from that situation as whole as I’d been walking in. I was told repeatedly by not only my friends that I was teetering on the edge of a massive disappointment, but by the main suspect himself. I thought about Bo, how no one ever had to tell him twice, and saw myself in comparison, running towards the proverbial electric fence that is my life. While Bo gave up, tucked his tail between his legs and resigned himself to a life of unfamiliar calm and solitude, I just keep getting back up, ignoring what I know to be true, and shocking the hell out of myself over and over again.
Friends are always quick to tell you after you’re dumped that you’ll do better, that there will be a next time, that eventually it’s all going to fall into place. I wonder if Bo would’ve believed anyone had they said to him that he should keep trying, that eventually he’d bust through that fence like he used to do, that maybe if he tried just one more time then he’d be on the other side tearing a juicy black bird to shreds. But animals seem to know better. They’re not the gambling kind. Why would Bo risk the possible shock when he could just avoid the fence altogether? Certain of only one thing, that trying again will hurt like the devil, Bo knew that nothing beyond that fence was even slightly worth the risk.
Twenty years after watching that dog lose his spirit to that fence, I admire him. As Bo grew older, whatever fascination he’d had with what lay beyond the fence floated away. My uncle awoke one morning years later, a violent thunderstorm having passed the night before. The fence had been blown down by the wind. And despite all that freedom presenting itself to him in a flash of lightning, there was Bo curled up on his blanket on the back porch.
A life spent sleeping on the back porch versus taking my chances at the edge of the yard seems more and more attractive to me as I get older. Knowing that whatever move I make towards a relationship is going to inevitably hurt, leave me burned, possibly embarassed and less than someone else better that came along, the fact that I’d ever even considered such a risk seems backwards, animalistic.
I’m going to start watching more of the Animal Planet and less Dr. Phil.
When I was growing up my uncle had a big bird dog named Bo. I’m not sure how Bo came to live with my uncle’s family, Bo having been raised and trained as a bird dog, and my uncle, who didn’t even hunt, living on half an acre in the suburbs. Needless to say, Bo was wild and not meant for a life confined in a tiny backyard. Bo was not the type of dog any of us kids wanted to play with. He was strong, hyper, dominating, constantly in motion. A visit into the backyard would certainly end with Bo tackling you to the ground. He escaped from their fenced-in backyard on many occassions, having seen a bird or a squirl on the other side, and was strong enough to barrel through the wooden fence like the Kool-Aid man. Bo was a force of nature not to be reckoned with.
Until one day my uncle came home with an electronic shock device that he placed around Bo’s neck. The thing on Bo’s neck would send shocks through him everytime he got too close to the fence. I had the misfortune of seeeing how Bo adapted to that shock collar. He stood still long enough for my uncle to strap it on his neck, then made his usual dash towards the fence. With a yelp that was heard all through the neighborhood, Bo’s life as a hunter ended. He spent the remainder of his days calm, subdued, one solid lesson learned and adapted to. Bo never got near that fence again.
Despite animals being of a lesser intellect, despite the fact that most animal species have been known to eat their own sh*t, they are something to be admired for their instant understanding of danger and harm. If a bird sees another bird eat a berry and then that bird drops dead, the other bird makes a mental note to itself, "don’t ever eat those berries." If a mouse knows that there is a certain area of the woods where being eaten up by an owl is a real threat, the mouse avoids that area. You don’t have to tell an animal twice. This may kill you. This may hurt like hell.
But not human beings. I’ve woken up almost every Sunday morning for the past fifteen years with a vicious hangover. Yet every Saturday night I’m right back on that track towards harm, ordering round after round of drinks with about a dozen cigarettes sprinkled in between. I know that I’m going to feel like I was run over by a tractor the next morning, but I don’t stop. And we all do that to some degree. We eat food that we know will make us fat or sick. We buy things that we probably can’t afford. And the biggest thing we do that no self-respecting animal would ever do, we walk willingly into situations where we know our hearts will break.
My mind wondered towards that bird dog Bo recently as I laid on the couch in my underwear, recently dumped, mulling over in my mind every blatant indication that I was not going to walk away from that situation as whole as I’d been walking in. I was told repeatedly by not only my friends that I was teetering on the edge of a massive disappointment, but by the main suspect himself. I thought about Bo, how no one ever had to tell him twice, and saw myself in comparison, running towards the proverbial electric fence that is my life. While Bo gave up, tucked his tail between his legs and resigned himself to a life of unfamiliar calm and solitude, I just keep getting back up, ignoring what I know to be true, and shocking the hell out of myself over and over again.
Friends are always quick to tell you after you’re dumped that you’ll do better, that there will be a next time, that eventually it’s all going to fall into place. I wonder if Bo would’ve believed anyone had they said to him that he should keep trying, that eventually he’d bust through that fence like he used to do, that maybe if he tried just one more time then he’d be on the other side tearing a juicy black bird to shreds. But animals seem to know better. They’re not the gambling kind. Why would Bo risk the possible shock when he could just avoid the fence altogether? Certain of only one thing, that trying again will hurt like the devil, Bo knew that nothing beyond that fence was even slightly worth the risk.
Twenty years after watching that dog lose his spirit to that fence, I admire him. As Bo grew older, whatever fascination he’d had with what lay beyond the fence floated away. My uncle awoke one morning years later, a violent thunderstorm having passed the night before. The fence had been blown down by the wind. And despite all that freedom presenting itself to him in a flash of lightning, there was Bo curled up on his blanket on the back porch.
A life spent sleeping on the back porch versus taking my chances at the edge of the yard seems more and more attractive to me as I get older. Knowing that whatever move I make towards a relationship is going to inevitably hurt, leave me burned, possibly embarassed and less than someone else better that came along, the fact that I’d ever even considered such a risk seems backwards, animalistic.
I’m going to start watching more of the Animal Planet and less Dr. Phil.
Non-committal or just a ho-ho-ho?
(Originally published 12/6/2006)
It’s Christmas time, a time for miracles they used to say. These days you can break your neck looking high and low for a miracle, a little something unexplainable to justify the brief feeling you have once a year that God exists. Although I can’t point to peace in Iraq, a cure for AIDS, or George Bush’s head on a plate to make you believe, I can let you in on a quiet little miracle going on this very instant: I’m dating someone!
We’re well into our 6th week, this guy and I, and although I’m still up to my old ways, hammering away at my insecurities and psychosis that keep popping up like a Whack-a-Mole, he still seems 100% interested and undistracted. Now famous for wanting a boyfriend, getting said boyfriend, then running for my life, I am trying my hardest to focus on only the good in this one. That he’s attractive, nice, hung, has a decent job, and thinks I’m hot. Sure, he’s doing those little things that have in the past irritated me enough to change my phone number and wear disguises (doesn’t watch television, puts too much product in his hair, calls me while walking down a loud, windy Chicago city street), but I’m hanging in there. I’m 30 years old now. It’s time to concentrate on a person’s devotion, their passion, their honesty, and not that you find it annoying how they use the word "lover" when describing an ex. Or that they despise both "The Simpsons" and "South Park." Or that they don’t vote…
OK. So, I’m having a hard time with this. Instead of looking deep within myself for the reasons that I tend to focus only on the boys who have little to no interest in me, then build walls between myself and the boys who actually are interested, rather than examining myself, seeking treatment, exposing my complicated neurosis and, God forbid, actually fixing this problem, I decided rather to simply ask my friends what was wrong with me.
I mentioned to my friend Elias that, in this particular situation, I need to either sh*t or get off the pot. Men tend to lose their patience around me. It’s not that I’m waiting on "the next best thing." At least I don’t feel like the type of *sshole that does that. It’s just that seemingly every time I give in and go for it, those tiny things I was able to look past in the beginning (the beginning not coincidentally being the time when the sex is always the best) seem to amplify themselves and take over my life. Suddenly, for example, their being "chatty" at first becomes a constant barrage of words and noise, an unbearable distraction forever interrupting my television time.
"Sweetie," he told me, "even Hermes only lets you wear the scarf in the store so long before they pull that sh*t off of your neck! The worst thing you could do is wait too long that he moves on and then you’ll regret it!"
Why, I then asked him, does it never feel like it’s enough?
He said, "I think it comes down to the natural male instinct: TO HUNT. Since we gays don’t typically do the hunting of wildlife, we replace it with our own form of wildlife: MEN. What fun is it in catching the deer licking himself next to the stream, not running at all from anything? NONE AT ALL."
Such profound words from a man who carries his dog around in a Coach bag.
I found these words encouraging, whereas they took the blame right off of me. It’s not that I’m sleazy or indecisive or afraid of commitment. I possibly am genetically prone to this type of behavior. Had I been born 1000 years ago and was only allowed to eat what I killed myself, my need to hunt would be well catered to and I’d never look beyond my hairy caveman husband for love and affection. Unless he grunted too much. Or his loin cloth didn’t match his club.
But, in our time, my hunting is restricted to Saturday nights in the gay bars. But even the cavemen, who HAD to hunt out of the necessity to survive, grew tired of the constant chase and began to farm and herd livestock instead. In a word, they evolved.
So, in celebration of the season of the birth of Jesus Christ, perhaps I’ll take a page from Charles Darwin. Maybe it’s time I evolved. I’m thinking of that fish in the evolutionary chain, the one who over time grew legs and learned to breathe outside of the water so that he could eat whatever was just beyond the shoreline. That fish wasn’t as stupid as I tend to be. He evolved to get what he wanted and never thought twice about going back into the ocean. Why would he? What he’d wanted so badly and strived so hard to get was right there in front of him. And even though he might’ve missed life in the ocean or the anticipation of getting his fins on whatever it was he’d been eyeballing for 16 billion years, he moved forward.
He eventually became a dog-loooking thing, then a monkey, I think maybe a bird for a time, then finally a human. But apparently not a gay human, otherwise he would’ve jumped right back in the water to start over.
It’s Christmas time, a time for miracles they used to say. These days you can break your neck looking high and low for a miracle, a little something unexplainable to justify the brief feeling you have once a year that God exists. Although I can’t point to peace in Iraq, a cure for AIDS, or George Bush’s head on a plate to make you believe, I can let you in on a quiet little miracle going on this very instant: I’m dating someone!
We’re well into our 6th week, this guy and I, and although I’m still up to my old ways, hammering away at my insecurities and psychosis that keep popping up like a Whack-a-Mole, he still seems 100% interested and undistracted. Now famous for wanting a boyfriend, getting said boyfriend, then running for my life, I am trying my hardest to focus on only the good in this one. That he’s attractive, nice, hung, has a decent job, and thinks I’m hot. Sure, he’s doing those little things that have in the past irritated me enough to change my phone number and wear disguises (doesn’t watch television, puts too much product in his hair, calls me while walking down a loud, windy Chicago city street), but I’m hanging in there. I’m 30 years old now. It’s time to concentrate on a person’s devotion, their passion, their honesty, and not that you find it annoying how they use the word "lover" when describing an ex. Or that they despise both "The Simpsons" and "South Park." Or that they don’t vote…
OK. So, I’m having a hard time with this. Instead of looking deep within myself for the reasons that I tend to focus only on the boys who have little to no interest in me, then build walls between myself and the boys who actually are interested, rather than examining myself, seeking treatment, exposing my complicated neurosis and, God forbid, actually fixing this problem, I decided rather to simply ask my friends what was wrong with me.
I mentioned to my friend Elias that, in this particular situation, I need to either sh*t or get off the pot. Men tend to lose their patience around me. It’s not that I’m waiting on "the next best thing." At least I don’t feel like the type of *sshole that does that. It’s just that seemingly every time I give in and go for it, those tiny things I was able to look past in the beginning (the beginning not coincidentally being the time when the sex is always the best) seem to amplify themselves and take over my life. Suddenly, for example, their being "chatty" at first becomes a constant barrage of words and noise, an unbearable distraction forever interrupting my television time.
"Sweetie," he told me, "even Hermes only lets you wear the scarf in the store so long before they pull that sh*t off of your neck! The worst thing you could do is wait too long that he moves on and then you’ll regret it!"
Why, I then asked him, does it never feel like it’s enough?
He said, "I think it comes down to the natural male instinct: TO HUNT. Since we gays don’t typically do the hunting of wildlife, we replace it with our own form of wildlife: MEN. What fun is it in catching the deer licking himself next to the stream, not running at all from anything? NONE AT ALL."
Such profound words from a man who carries his dog around in a Coach bag.
I found these words encouraging, whereas they took the blame right off of me. It’s not that I’m sleazy or indecisive or afraid of commitment. I possibly am genetically prone to this type of behavior. Had I been born 1000 years ago and was only allowed to eat what I killed myself, my need to hunt would be well catered to and I’d never look beyond my hairy caveman husband for love and affection. Unless he grunted too much. Or his loin cloth didn’t match his club.
But, in our time, my hunting is restricted to Saturday nights in the gay bars. But even the cavemen, who HAD to hunt out of the necessity to survive, grew tired of the constant chase and began to farm and herd livestock instead. In a word, they evolved.
So, in celebration of the season of the birth of Jesus Christ, perhaps I’ll take a page from Charles Darwin. Maybe it’s time I evolved. I’m thinking of that fish in the evolutionary chain, the one who over time grew legs and learned to breathe outside of the water so that he could eat whatever was just beyond the shoreline. That fish wasn’t as stupid as I tend to be. He evolved to get what he wanted and never thought twice about going back into the ocean. Why would he? What he’d wanted so badly and strived so hard to get was right there in front of him. And even though he might’ve missed life in the ocean or the anticipation of getting his fins on whatever it was he’d been eyeballing for 16 billion years, he moved forward.
He eventually became a dog-loooking thing, then a monkey, I think maybe a bird for a time, then finally a human. But apparently not a gay human, otherwise he would’ve jumped right back in the water to start over.
I'm not as thirsty as I'd thought.
(Originally published 8/22/2006)
Water, water everywhere. Not a drop to drink.
This is my current philosophy concerning the state of my singlehood. I used to fear what I thought were the odds, as if statistically I was running out of "at-bats." The older I got, the more boys I met, the more dinner dates I crawled out of restaurant bathroom windows to escape, I worried that the well would run dry. I worried that the next big break I got at a relationship, the next chance that strolled over towards me at the gay bar, would be my last. That I would wake up one morning, the barrel of my gun empty. That was my last shot.
But I realize now that by no means are the odds against me. There are boyfriends everywhere! There’s a boyfriend for you at the grocery store! There’s a boyfriend right there next to you on the bus! Heck, there’s even a boyfriend for you at work! All you have to do to make him yours is do what so many of our friends and family members do everyday in regards to relationships. No, I’m not talking about sharing, committing, or devoting yourself to someone else whole-heartedly. That stuff’s way too hard. Put down your self-help relationship books. You don’t have to read to learn how to settle!
I think once some people hit a certain age and they still don’t have steady companionship to accompany them to office Christmas parties and family weddings, that they fear being alone more than they fear a life chained to someone with irreversible psychopathic social traits. The idea of not having someone help them take out the trash takes priority over the fact that your mate doesn’t have a job, talks too much, or is a self-hating, masochistic, gay Republican.
I’ve observed in recent months a series of random couplings, seeing single people I know, single people whom I can recall breaking up with someone because they read "The Bridges of Madison County" or because they thought Condoleezza Rice was something you found next to the Little Ben’s at the grocery store. But now, they’ve pushed aside such traits as irrelevance. I’m focused on the person’s heart, they say. Yes, indeed. I stare right past that uni-brow into their soul. And when they begin explaining to my mother their conspiracy theory that Elvis and Richard Nixon were responsible for the Pet Rock, I only hear trace whispers of comfort floating from their pierced, tattooed lips.
So, at 30, I have had to re-evaluate my place in this world. I stopped looking at couples and thinking, "What’s wrong with me?" I’ve started looking at couples and thinking, "What’s wrong with them?" Truth be told we could all get married tomorrow. I could stroll right up to the guy that stands outside of the train station, the guy who screams enraged proclamations of Jesus’ love to everyone coming in and out, and tell him that I find his words moving, beautiful, and then ask him out on a date. I could tell the guy in Accounting with pictures of Leonard Nimoy in his cubicle that I like his toupee, then see if he’d like to grab some lunch.
Sure, some couples I am still jealous of, the ones with no visible scars, where both partners speak clear English and know how to work their ATM cards. But as Father Time pushes me forward, a couple whom I honestly admire is getting harder to find than food in Nicole Richie’s refrigerator. When the majority of couples you interact with consists of one partner so undesirable that his ex-wife left him in the middle of the night, a mail order bride from Afghanistan with only 4 teeth, it’s hard to be jealous.
Settling is no longer something you only read about in history books about the Old West. It is a real and sneaky phenomenon creeping up on single folks everywhere. It’s a great thing for that guy I work with who always smells like fish, or that woman with the mullet hair cut I saw yesterday on the street. It guarantees them a shot at true love. But for me, it’s not such a good thing. My single friends are dying off, choosing a quiet night at home with their mutant boyfriends over a night out on the town chasing tail with me.
So the grass isn’t always greener. I’d rather be frustrated with the single life than frustrated because my boyfriend’s telling my boss about his scat fetish. Again. Even after I’d begged him never to share that with anyone after the way Grandma reacted.
Water, water everywhere. Not a drop to drink.
This is my current philosophy concerning the state of my singlehood. I used to fear what I thought were the odds, as if statistically I was running out of "at-bats." The older I got, the more boys I met, the more dinner dates I crawled out of restaurant bathroom windows to escape, I worried that the well would run dry. I worried that the next big break I got at a relationship, the next chance that strolled over towards me at the gay bar, would be my last. That I would wake up one morning, the barrel of my gun empty. That was my last shot.
But I realize now that by no means are the odds against me. There are boyfriends everywhere! There’s a boyfriend for you at the grocery store! There’s a boyfriend right there next to you on the bus! Heck, there’s even a boyfriend for you at work! All you have to do to make him yours is do what so many of our friends and family members do everyday in regards to relationships. No, I’m not talking about sharing, committing, or devoting yourself to someone else whole-heartedly. That stuff’s way too hard. Put down your self-help relationship books. You don’t have to read to learn how to settle!
I think once some people hit a certain age and they still don’t have steady companionship to accompany them to office Christmas parties and family weddings, that they fear being alone more than they fear a life chained to someone with irreversible psychopathic social traits. The idea of not having someone help them take out the trash takes priority over the fact that your mate doesn’t have a job, talks too much, or is a self-hating, masochistic, gay Republican.
I’ve observed in recent months a series of random couplings, seeing single people I know, single people whom I can recall breaking up with someone because they read "The Bridges of Madison County" or because they thought Condoleezza Rice was something you found next to the Little Ben’s at the grocery store. But now, they’ve pushed aside such traits as irrelevance. I’m focused on the person’s heart, they say. Yes, indeed. I stare right past that uni-brow into their soul. And when they begin explaining to my mother their conspiracy theory that Elvis and Richard Nixon were responsible for the Pet Rock, I only hear trace whispers of comfort floating from their pierced, tattooed lips.
So, at 30, I have had to re-evaluate my place in this world. I stopped looking at couples and thinking, "What’s wrong with me?" I’ve started looking at couples and thinking, "What’s wrong with them?" Truth be told we could all get married tomorrow. I could stroll right up to the guy that stands outside of the train station, the guy who screams enraged proclamations of Jesus’ love to everyone coming in and out, and tell him that I find his words moving, beautiful, and then ask him out on a date. I could tell the guy in Accounting with pictures of Leonard Nimoy in his cubicle that I like his toupee, then see if he’d like to grab some lunch.
Sure, some couples I am still jealous of, the ones with no visible scars, where both partners speak clear English and know how to work their ATM cards. But as Father Time pushes me forward, a couple whom I honestly admire is getting harder to find than food in Nicole Richie’s refrigerator. When the majority of couples you interact with consists of one partner so undesirable that his ex-wife left him in the middle of the night, a mail order bride from Afghanistan with only 4 teeth, it’s hard to be jealous.
Settling is no longer something you only read about in history books about the Old West. It is a real and sneaky phenomenon creeping up on single folks everywhere. It’s a great thing for that guy I work with who always smells like fish, or that woman with the mullet hair cut I saw yesterday on the street. It guarantees them a shot at true love. But for me, it’s not such a good thing. My single friends are dying off, choosing a quiet night at home with their mutant boyfriends over a night out on the town chasing tail with me.
So the grass isn’t always greener. I’d rather be frustrated with the single life than frustrated because my boyfriend’s telling my boss about his scat fetish. Again. Even after I’d begged him never to share that with anyone after the way Grandma reacted.
Who?
(Originally published 4/10/2006)
I was sitting at home alone recently having quality nose-picking-in-front of-the-television-time when my phone rang. I didn’t recognize the number but muted "The Simpsons" and took the call anyway.
"Hi, Tony," the voice on the other end says, "This is Tom."
My brain is suddenly jerked awake, staggering about in my skull like a drunk person ripped from sleep by a fire alarm. Tom. Tom. Tom? Let’s see. Who the h*ll is Tom? Is Tom that dude who showed me an apartment last weekend? Is this that Tom guy from work? Is Tom that boy from Champaign I mugged down with over the Christmas holidays? Then it hits me. Tom is a guy I met almost three weeks ago. We exchanged numbers. I left a message for him a few days later and never heard back from him.
"Tom from a few weeks ago?" I ask.
He confirmed that he indeed was that Tom. I couldn’t for the life of me figure out why someone would wait so long before the initial pre-first-date phone call. Maybe he was calling to tell me that he was recently diagnosed with Syphillis and that I should schedule a doctor’s appointment as soon as possible. Oh, wait. I didn’t sleep with him.
"Sorry I’m just getting around to calling you back," he says, "I’ve been busy."
I’ll say. Just how busy do you have to be to wait three weeks to return someone’s phone call? My imagination runs wild. Perhaps he was camping and suffered from a poisonous snakebite. Or what if he was kidnapped at gunpoint and has been held hostage in the back of a black van by sexy, Russian bank robbers? Or the lottery. Yes, he won the lottery and has spent the last couple of weeks trying to decipher what to do with his newfound millions. And now he’s calling to invite me to Paris for the weekend!
His story couldn’t be further from my exciting "Knots Landing" type story lines. He blames work. Hmph.
This has become a recent trend in my life; meeting a guy, spending a week or so feeling sorry for myself because they never called, spending another week looking over my shoulder for them when I’m out with my friends, then a week forgetting that I’d ever met them in the first place, only to have them then call me out of the blue. I’m left holding the phone, scratching my head in outright confusion. Was this guy the teacher? Was he that Republican who bought me a beer and a shot? Or was this the guy that shagged my friend Eric? Maybe this is the guy who was the FBI agent. Have I ever met an FBI agent? No. That was a porn I rented last weekend.
I’ve been told that I have the attention span of a gerbil with ADD. It is not helpful that these guys follow up with me so long after first meeting me. It is especially difficult when these guys ask me to dinner "sometime next week," as Tom did. Now am I not only expected to remember Tom, but by the time I pull the chair out from under the table and join him for dinner it will have been almost a month since I laid eyes on him. And given the fact that I met him in a bar, the eyes that I laid on him were probably blurred and fuzzy through a haze of Miller Lite and cheap fruity shots.
This level of "busy" astounds me. I doubt that even the Pope or Oprah are so busy that they can’t squeeze in a four-minute conversation with someone. I don’t know anyone who makes plans with someone weeks in advance. He couldn’t have called me while he was waiting at the dry cleaners last Saturday? Couldn’t he have put down that eleven-year-old People magazine and given me a call while waiting at the dentist’s office two weeks ago? Who do these types think they are anyway?
"I’ll be at the Starbucks on Broadway Thursday, March 27th from 11:15 to 11:19 in the morning. Come by. We’ll chat for a bit while I wait on my latte."
There has to be a better excuse than work. My theory when you don’t hear back from someone within a week is that you are not the only person they met that night. The other person got the phone call 2 days later and the dinner date the following weekend. They were instantly drawn to this other person and half way through dinner they were daydreaming about what their best friend would say during their toast at the reception. Unfortunately, the other person turned out to be married with six Mormon children and a mortgage out in the suburbs. And suddenly they’re not too busy to call you back.
But I’m a sucker for a free meal, so I accepted anyway. I’m aware that I’m getting Ishmael’s sloppy seconds, but after the second bottle of wine I doubt I’ll give a sh*t.
I was sitting at home alone recently having quality nose-picking-in-front of-the-television-time when my phone rang. I didn’t recognize the number but muted "The Simpsons" and took the call anyway.
"Hi, Tony," the voice on the other end says, "This is Tom."
My brain is suddenly jerked awake, staggering about in my skull like a drunk person ripped from sleep by a fire alarm. Tom. Tom. Tom? Let’s see. Who the h*ll is Tom? Is Tom that dude who showed me an apartment last weekend? Is this that Tom guy from work? Is Tom that boy from Champaign I mugged down with over the Christmas holidays? Then it hits me. Tom is a guy I met almost three weeks ago. We exchanged numbers. I left a message for him a few days later and never heard back from him.
"Tom from a few weeks ago?" I ask.
He confirmed that he indeed was that Tom. I couldn’t for the life of me figure out why someone would wait so long before the initial pre-first-date phone call. Maybe he was calling to tell me that he was recently diagnosed with Syphillis and that I should schedule a doctor’s appointment as soon as possible. Oh, wait. I didn’t sleep with him.
"Sorry I’m just getting around to calling you back," he says, "I’ve been busy."
I’ll say. Just how busy do you have to be to wait three weeks to return someone’s phone call? My imagination runs wild. Perhaps he was camping and suffered from a poisonous snakebite. Or what if he was kidnapped at gunpoint and has been held hostage in the back of a black van by sexy, Russian bank robbers? Or the lottery. Yes, he won the lottery and has spent the last couple of weeks trying to decipher what to do with his newfound millions. And now he’s calling to invite me to Paris for the weekend!
His story couldn’t be further from my exciting "Knots Landing" type story lines. He blames work. Hmph.
This has become a recent trend in my life; meeting a guy, spending a week or so feeling sorry for myself because they never called, spending another week looking over my shoulder for them when I’m out with my friends, then a week forgetting that I’d ever met them in the first place, only to have them then call me out of the blue. I’m left holding the phone, scratching my head in outright confusion. Was this guy the teacher? Was he that Republican who bought me a beer and a shot? Or was this the guy that shagged my friend Eric? Maybe this is the guy who was the FBI agent. Have I ever met an FBI agent? No. That was a porn I rented last weekend.
I’ve been told that I have the attention span of a gerbil with ADD. It is not helpful that these guys follow up with me so long after first meeting me. It is especially difficult when these guys ask me to dinner "sometime next week," as Tom did. Now am I not only expected to remember Tom, but by the time I pull the chair out from under the table and join him for dinner it will have been almost a month since I laid eyes on him. And given the fact that I met him in a bar, the eyes that I laid on him were probably blurred and fuzzy through a haze of Miller Lite and cheap fruity shots.
This level of "busy" astounds me. I doubt that even the Pope or Oprah are so busy that they can’t squeeze in a four-minute conversation with someone. I don’t know anyone who makes plans with someone weeks in advance. He couldn’t have called me while he was waiting at the dry cleaners last Saturday? Couldn’t he have put down that eleven-year-old People magazine and given me a call while waiting at the dentist’s office two weeks ago? Who do these types think they are anyway?
"I’ll be at the Starbucks on Broadway Thursday, March 27th from 11:15 to 11:19 in the morning. Come by. We’ll chat for a bit while I wait on my latte."
There has to be a better excuse than work. My theory when you don’t hear back from someone within a week is that you are not the only person they met that night. The other person got the phone call 2 days later and the dinner date the following weekend. They were instantly drawn to this other person and half way through dinner they were daydreaming about what their best friend would say during their toast at the reception. Unfortunately, the other person turned out to be married with six Mormon children and a mortgage out in the suburbs. And suddenly they’re not too busy to call you back.
But I’m a sucker for a free meal, so I accepted anyway. I’m aware that I’m getting Ishmael’s sloppy seconds, but after the second bottle of wine I doubt I’ll give a sh*t.
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