My First Date

Granted, I've historically had a knack for making disastrous relationship choices. But even if I hadn’t been fatally drawn to brooding misanthropes and borderline wing nuts, I think I'm just happier on my own. As a little girl, I was appalled at the idea of tying myself to some man, and through my teens and into adulthood, I was never keen on getting married – even on my wedding day.








This is about what it would take to get me to the altar again.










For sure, the best periods of my life have all coincided with being single. I love being able to do what I want, free from the constant need to consult, negotiate and compromise; with nobody commandeering the tv remote, or randomly whacking me in the face at night while stealing the blankets and crowding me off the bed; nobody draining my energy with the incessant neediness of their ego and libido; no danger of falling into that sinkhole of working so hard to please somebody else that I forget what it's like to please myself.

Still, the default human position is to crave meaningful companionship beyond what a few cats can provide. And even I, the champion of contented solitude, am not immune to the mythical allure of romantic love… even though I know that the fairy tale too often ends with a once-dashing prince gone to indifferent, love-handled seed; and a once-radiant princess transformed by broken dreams and drudgery into a resentful witch.







Before....

...and after

When my last relationship ended, it was the hearty kick up the emotional arse that culminated several exhausting and traumatic years: I’d moved twice within 8 months; I'd fought hard to retrain myself in a highly demanding profession while beating against heaving tides of incredibly malicious co-worker retardation; I'd endured 5 years of vindictive psychological torture from the ex-husband while bleeding out a small fortune in a farcically doomed attempt to get him to at least marginally comply with our custody agreement; and I'd just spent the summer in swooning misery, because the quack at my local clinic kept insisting that my wheezing and feverish delirium were due to exhaustion and an allergic reaction to the filth kicked up by the brickworkers who had banged and shouted outside all my windows for two months.

It wasn't until I'd nearly passed out on the metro after a gang of nuns fluttered on board and settled around me like a flock of grey, benevolent birds coming to roost at the edges of my own personal apocalypse, and I couldn’t quite tell whether I was hallucinating or not, that I crawled to a clinic with for-real doctors and was diagnosed with walking pneumonia. After two courses of antibiotics, I then spent a few weeks violently pissing out my throbbing ass and living in fear that I was going to soil my pants with boiling liquid stink whenever i wasn't within 10 seconds of a bathroom, because none of the geniuses who’d tossed me all those pills had thought to mention that too many antibiotics can turn your bowels into a rollicking shit slide of terror, and I’d need to eat some yogurt to get my gut biotics back in order.

It was just one god-damned thing after another. My misfortune seemed epically cruel and interminable, like a community theatre production of the Vagina Monologues.

Just as I was finally starting to get a grip on my physical health, the boyfriend that I was still smitten with… even though he'd long since devolved from being an adoring tonic into a dragging weight who was sucking the life out of me with his pointless negativity and crippling neuroses (think Eeyore, but without the cute friends)… gave me the finger for Christmas, by cutting off all contact under the pretense of the old “I need time to think” canard. I didn’t matter that I knew I’d be better off without him – I was still shocked and devastated. To be rejected by somebody who was so off the rails that he’d had a panic attack when he tried to go shopping for pants, well… I couldn’t see how I could get any lower.

So there I was, an absolute washed-out wreck. Because I'd devoted all my spare time coddling the socially phobic Sir Mopesalot, I'd lost touch with the few friends still standing after the acrid debris of my imploded marriage cleared. I didn’t dare try to reconnect with them now… I was so filled with hurt and bitterness that I literally could not say anything nice about anything. I felt that if the tight lid of my anguish was uncorked by the kindness of a friend, it was likely I’d drown them in a blasting spew of emotional gore so livid it would make Dario Argento blanch, and scare them off forever. I needed time to let the evil dissipate.

I spent the winter staring dolefully out cafe windows, too depleted to scratch out self-indulgent blank verse in a wee moleskin notebook. Maudlin narratives about brave and loyal pets or random acts of human kindness made me weep like an open sore. Dumb country music hurtin’ songs were suddenly profound and meaningful. When I saw happy couples canoodling in public, I had to fight back the urge to attack them with my misery stick. Potato chips became a primary food group.

Classic, full-blown emotional meltdown? You betcha!

By the time the dirty end of winter rolled around, it seemed imperative that I reintegrate with the living or I’d fall off the edge of less than functionally sane

And of course, when you've been left feeling like you're dragging your bloodied heart around behind you on a ragged little string, the impulse is to fill that aching hole with somebody new.

Sitting in my local café, I’d scope out the male landscape, dreamily mooning over the shaggy haired intellectual types that have always been my weakness. Oh yes… there’s a lovely specimen, all furrow-browed over his dog-eared copy of Infinite Jest; his lean frame poured into some standard-issue beplaided hipster rumplement; looking so soulfully in need of a good woman to feed him, nurture his sensitive artistic soul through the dark valleys of existential torment, and subsidize his student loans… no, wait … GET A GRIP! You’re a middle-aged woman, so stop looking at delicious dead-end boys. You know they're poison anyway.

And I could probably forget about that chiseled-jawed late-30-something. Even if he wasn't also too young for me, he’s likely already got somebody at home slow-cooking something organic in the tagine while mulling between “Sadie” or “Talullah” as names for their first-born.

Realistically, my prospects were more like…oh Lord… that paunchy guy with the scraggly greying hair willowing off in all directions from his receding hairline; sallow, drooping skin and eye bags; ear hair; and a stretch of brown sock revealed by his too-short pants, squinting through crooked reading glasses at a David Suzuki biography.

Had it REALLY come to this?

The ideal...

...the reality

NO!!!!! Please, please, merciful baby Jesus, there had to be some eligible males in my age bracket with more charisma and style than a crumpled swatch of flannel. I needed to broaden the search…adopt a new methodology for the hunt…because wandering around scowling and looking bereft didn’t appear to be working.

With the advent of the spring mating season, ads for LavaLife blossomed all over the metro. I’d always considered on-line dating as something that only the pathetic and desperate would do. I mean, what kind of loser has a life so devoid of friends and social options that they have to use the Internet to get a life? … oh. Right. That would be me.

I still felt too bruised to fall in love or to jump into in some kind of more casual coupling; and I highly doubted that I’d find anybody I’d click with on a site that was pitched at loopy girly singletons who liked to giggle on the phone with studly jocks.
But I’d never actually gone on a date, and was just plain curious about the whole concept. Plus, it seemed a reasonable way to pry open some new social doors; or at the very least, get me out of the house of an otherwise bleak Saturday night and give me some good stories to tell. Given that I’d be dealing with innocent strangers, I’d be forced to leave the pathetic, broken me at home and at least ACT interesting and engaging.

I worried about putting myself up for scrutiny on the Internet … the nature of the medium is that you are primarily judged on how you look, and I’ve got my insecurities like anybody else. But then I figured: every new interaction in real life involves a mutual flurry of snap superficial judgements. So what the hell. Its not like I had much dignity left anyway.

I put together what I hoped was a deft summary of my wit, intelligence and non-conventional charms, added a few pictures that honestly alluded to, yet minimized the ravages of time, and made my cyberdating debut.

The initial flurry of messages in my inbox might have been heartening, had they not all fallen into one of these templates:

1) “Hello beutiful lady. I am hard body, and reddy to give you to hot love.”

[Late 30s/early 40s. Picture shows swarthy guido in a muscle shirt leaning on a black car. Two-sentence profile riddled with typos, random capitals, and animated emoticons of dancing pickles holding beer bottles; interests include working out and beef].

2) “Hello. I am an easy going and down to earth guy. I am looking for a warm-hearted lady to fill my life with happiness and cuddles. We seem to have a lot in common. Please check out my profile and contact me if you agree.”

[Anywhere from early 40s to late 60s. Picture shows pudgy, frumpy white man in pleated tan pants, in the bleakest of suburban rooms, caught in the blank-faced action of doing absolutely nothing of even marginal interest. Profile says that they are easy going and down to earth; are looking for a warm-hearted lady to fill their lives with happiness and cuddles; like classic rock and light jazz, and oatmeal].

3) “Hi. U R hot!!!! U like yung men? Txt me @ cougareater[Skinny, shirtless 20-yr-old boy affecting an expression of smouldering intensity in spite of the fact that he’s probably nervous about his mom, who’d be my age, walking in and catching him posing like a porn star in front of his webcam.

[Profile reads: “WOOO!!! Let’s party! Srsly! LOL”]

Ok so…it was my worst fears realized. And then some.

Browsing through random profiles of guys in my age bracket didn’t do much to bolster my optimism. If they weren’t overtly anti-attractive or creepy, they were either super outdoorsy jock-A-types (pictures of them kayaking, rock-climbing, hiking up Maccu Picchu, wallowing in a pile of gortex and generally looking insufferably hearty and keen); too drippingly new agey (soft-focus close-up of them staring soulfully into the distance by candlelight; doing a yoga pose on a lakeshore at sunset), or just too… err… normal (In theory, there’s nothing wrong with guys who work in sales, drive SUVs, live in the suburbs, own cycling outfits, and think it would be cool to see Daughtry play warm-up on the Eagles reunion tour. But given that my lifestyle is the antithesis of that, getting through a half-hour coffee date with somebody like that would be an awkward and pointless slog for both of us).

Say, what's that smell? Steamy spandex and a hint of overachieverism?

After several months of nothing but lewd and misspelled propositions from baboons, I finally received a message from a guy who had actually bothered to write me a fairly lengthy and articulate introduction. I checked out his profile. My age (no need to fret over my “bitch lines” and other facial creases); college teacher (educated! employed!); in good shape (not a schlumpy potato!); 2 grown kids (Capable of stability and responsibility!); could pass for ok looking (if I took my glasses off); pictured in a canoe (Owns car/can be leveraged for dearly missed escapes to the country?!?!?).

Bright red alarm flags did start snapping in the wind when I saw that he called himself “BladeDancer” (*cough*) because he enjoyed getting out on his in-line skates and moving to music on his ipod (oh...boy....). But in keeping with my resolve to loosen up and be more open to sampling outside my usual disastrous hip-altster demographic, I thought: Hey… maybe its not as painfully dinkish as it sounds. And if I’m going to be a completely resistent tight-ass with impossible standards, I might as well give up.

We began a correspondance. He seemed intelligent, thoughtful, mature, decent and kind. He could spell and punctuate. He was patient and sympathetic. Seemed I could… and had… done much worse.
Finally, he proposed that we meet. I wasn’t sure that we had much in common; he persuaded me by saying that eventually, I’d have to start taking a chance or two. Going against all my instincts, I told him to call me at work the next afternoon with a time and place. Then immediately regretted it.

I barely slept. All the next day, I fretted about whether I should back out. My workmates said: “No, no! You should go! What have you got to lose?” They convinced me that my increasing sense of dread was just schoolgirlish nerves.

He sounded human when he called. Told me to meet him at café that had nice food and “a good vibe” (T-W-I-N-G! Mini flag!). Said he’d be coming from a tennis game and would be wearing shorts, sandals, and a CBC baseball cap.

Oh mama. There it is, right there. CBC hat?? So the sandals would be Birkenstocks, right? God help me, I was indeed headed into a shit-storm of dinkditude. But it was too late to back out now.

I arrived a bit early. The venue held bad portends: It had a hippie-folkish name and ambiance and was populated with anglo university students with that annoyingly chipper self-importance about them while they plucked away at laptops. Sufjian Stevens snivelled in the background. The walls were hung with aggressively lame art that looked like it had been painted by one of those insipid trust fund chicks who won’t accept that she has zero talent and who pretentiously adores gits like Sufjian Stevens; but who will one day abandon her faux-boho pretentions, marry a lawyer, and spend her time on school committees and charity drives. (T-W-I-N-G! Flag!).

Aside from having a confusingly uninterpretable first name, Mr. Stevens plays the banjo and likes to wear wings.

I rest my case.

It was a smouldering hot day, and I had a pounding sleep-deprivation headache, so I ordered a nice cool beer to help smooth the edges.

Just when I figured the legendary Mr. Blade Dancer had stood me up and I could run away, he shows up, 25 minutes late. He says “Oh. You’re drinking a BEER,” with more than a hint of disapproval. (Flag!)

I cop a look down and indeed, he’s wearing the dreaded Birkenstocks…. (Flaaag!)

….With socks. (Wildly flapping red flag, and screeching alarm sirens!!)

That’s a dealbreaker within a dealbreaker, wrapped in hopelessness.

Is it a chilly hobbit? No, its MY DATE!!








It didn’t get better. We were able to fill the time with talk, but it felt more like an intense interview than a conversation. After a bit, I figured out why I felt so rattled: here I was, the nervous quipster, dealing with one of these freaky people who have no discernable sense of humour. He did not smile once, and seemed perplexed and vaguely annoyed when I said something intended to be amusing. I’ve felt more warmth and geniality from snakes.

When his food arrived, he poked around examining everything, like he didn’t trust it. Then he opened his ham sandwich and shook an obscene amount of salt into it, muttering that he “probably” ate too much salt on everything. PROBABLY?? How can ham not be salty enough? You want a salt lick with a soy sauce chaser on the side with that?

(A whole flagpole of waving flags on fire!)

I felt like I’d gotten off the bus in a grim and joyless freakytown. I had not felt such twitching and appalled discomfort since the time I saw my ex in-laws running around in their underwear; maman with her massively quivering blue-marbled cottage cheese thighs, and dear ol’ daddyo with his undershirt tucked smartly into his Y-fronts, which were pulled up to near self-wedgie heights.

I couldn’t believe I’d wasted two seconds worrying about what to wear, or what kind of impression I’d make, when I was now pinned under the withering Gorgonlike gaze of a guy who seemed to have all kinds of hang ups about nothing, and who couldn’t be bothered to put on a decent pair of shoes for a first date. Or show up on time. It might have helped if I could just keep drinking, but didn’t dare order another beer, in case it prompted Mr. Buzzkill to loudly denounce me as a depraved harlot while throwing salt in my eyes.

All my gut feelings about the vaguely disturbing odours underlying everything he’d written in his profile and emails had been spot on. “Into the bliss of dancing on skates” my ass – this guy was skating the fine edge of whacko.

Finally, to our mutual relief, it was over.

I actually shuddered as I turned to head off to the metro.

In spite of everything, I felt that the civil thing to do would be to send this guy, who had put so much effort into convincing a stranger to take a small step outside their anti-social shell, a little follow-up note that just said: “Thanks. Nice to meet you." Just because we'd mutually appalled each other, there was no reason to not be polite.

And you know what? Son of a bitch didn’t respond. Shunned me like I was a turd that he’d accidentally picked up.

So even though the date was a complete dud, from this and other experiences, I have developed a few rules to enable me to more adeptly play the dating game:

1) For the most part, the axiom “if a guy past 35 is still single, there’s a good reason why” holds true.

2) If it doesn’t smell right up front, walk away. Fast.

3 ) More so than in real life, virtual suitors will turn on the charm as long as there’s a slim chance that it’ll set them on the path to Shagtown. Once they realize its not going to happen, they drop the act and let the jerk back out. Shameless liars abound. Believe nothing until you see it. And even then, BEWARE!!! 4) I can embrace the uncommon liberty that on-line anonymity offers with no guilt. Although its not worth responding to pigs, its still kind of fun to know that I can be as blunt and brutally honest as any given situation warrants.

5) You seriously CAN’T …and shouldn’t… trust anybody who wears Birkenstocks.








Also out: 48-yr-olds who wear leather pants.

---P.S.

This was perhaps the most depressing suggested match sent to me by any dating site. According to their super-advanced matchmatching algorithm of love, we were a near-perfect match, at 98% compatible.

So apparently, this is my soul mate.