I was very excited when he finally asked me out. We had been instant messaging through the dating website over the last several weeks, and I was dazzled by his wit. The first paragraph of his online profile is a symphony of sarcasm that hit every note of annoyance, pessimism, and reluctant resignation I have been feeling about online dating:
I am old, worn out, torn up with a bitter broken heart and I am a cheap skate. I have baggage, an ex who comes over unannounced in the middle of the night. My teenage daughter is pregnant with her second child, father unknown. My son is a meth addict and routinely breaks in to steal something from the house. I make a living smuggling people across the border. I love my job, never a dull moment as it really caters to my creative side.
He seemed to love my sense of humor too, and our jokes organically fed off each other. He is a year older than me and he loves to ski. I was ready to run off to Vegas with him, sight unseen, but I settled for dinner only a short car ride away. From the moment I woke up on the day of the big date, it felt like Christmas, Halloween, New Year's Eve in Times Square, and the 50-1 longshot you played just getting up to win by a nose, all rolled into one.
When I parked in the lot behind the restaurant, I texted him to say I had just arrived and that, "my profile pictures were 15 years old -- hope that's not a deal breaker!" His reply? "Oh good. Mine are even older."
I walked right past him as he leaned against the hood of his car while he checked his phone. He didn't really look like the hilarious guy I had animated in my head based on his texts and a few shot-at-a-distance photos of him. I went into the restaurant to find him, but came back out when I realized that car-hood-leaner was him. We hugged, but it felt awkward, since I was hugging a stranger. Little did I know, but that was only an appetizer of awkwardness. The whole seven-course meal was ahead of me.
He seemed *completely* not into me, as if he were disappointed with the reality. He didn't say anything about the way I looked, even though I was wearing a dress, and I looked good. I had made an effort. Even if I'm not your type, if I've put on a dress -- A F*CKING DRESS, PEOPLE! -- you'd better say something, even something innocuous like 'You look nice,' otherwise you're just a social clod. I got nothing.
He was distracted throughout dinner, often checking out the thin 20-year-old single mom in the tank top and mini skirt who repeatedly let her young toddler bang her head hard on the table they shared with a group of her 20-something friends. He was rarely present or focused on me, and he didn't say one funny thing all night. It was as if a different person showed up for our date! Perhaps he had a humorless twin brother who had bound and gagged the hilarious twin I had been texting, just so he could take his place.
I can usually find something to talk about with anyone, but I struggled. Finally, when I asked him what he had planned that weekend, he told me he was going to shop for a "yacht." His word. Not a boat. Not a sailboat. Not even a big-ass boat. A yacht. He was going to spend the weekend yacht shopping. I could not relate.
This is when my bad date went to 11. "Not Into Me" mentioned he had previously worked at a well known internet company, the same one where my ex-husband worked for a year or two. Not only did they work there at the same time in the same building, they both worked at the small publicly traded company that the large well known internet company had acquired! Not Into Me searched his phone for my ex-husband's name, and when he couldn't find it, he checked my ex's LinkedIn profile. The 54 people they both knew on LinkedIn wasn't the only thing they had in common though. I realized they both behaved the same way toward me during dinner -- with almost complete indifference. As if they wanted to be anywhere else at that moment. And certainly not with me.
The check couldn't and didn't come fast enough. When it did, I offered to split the bill as I always do on a first date. In all my first dates, I can't remember a guy taking me up on that offer. Until now. Naturally, the guy who was planning to spend his weekend yacht shopping is the one who wanted to split the bill. Whatever. It was a small price to pay to end the awkward misery.
Not Into Me had parked right in front of the restaurant, so he just said good night, hopped in his car, and drove away. He didn't offer to walk me to my car, which was parked in the lot in back. After a night of utter disinterest in me, I was not surprised, and relieved that I wouldn't have to endure even five more minutes of him. I practically skipped back to my car, happy to cross this dud off my list and hopeful that my next date wouldn't be the train wreck this one was.
Two days later, Not Into Me texted me and asked me out again. WTF?! Bet you didn't see that coming. Neither did I. I was stunned and confused. Then it was he who was stunned and confused when I turned him down, telling him I thought there was zero in-person chemistry between us. He said he was tired that night and that he really liked me. No matter. There is no way I will ever knowingly go out with a guy whose behavior towards me reminds me of my ex-husband's during the most unhappy part of our marriage.
Dating is hard. Dating strangers is even harder. Sometimes I wonder how anyone can discover that special someone through the distorting haze of expectation and imagination that clouds online dating websites. Then I go back online to take another hit off that distortion and let myself get carried away again.
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