I distinctly seem to remember that during high school and college, I was the guy that could flirt outrageously while still remaining cute. I was the guy that could be bold enough to be romantic and memorable. Somewhere during my mid-20s, boldness was replaced with “crippling shyness” and outrageous but cute flirtation has been revamped as “inappropriate comments that increase awkwardness.” (If I could compare my life to Friends for a second, the past two years of my life re: women can be summed up by The One Where Ross Can’t Flirt.) (Ok, Just finished about 10 25 minutes of watching Friends clips on youtube. Thanks for wasting my time, internet!)
But, 12minds, you ask, “While you’re totally awkward at the beginning, you get better! Who can resist your wit, your charm, your cute smile, and your jokes?”
Apparently quite a few women, it turns out. Quite a few.
So great is my combination of social awkwardness generally with weirdness specifically that I’ve been on three dates in the past year and a half or so. Now we’ll use the word ‘date’ liberally so as to make myself feel a little bit better in continuing on with this story.
Date #1 was with…let’s call her “unimpressive book club girl,” and #2 was to confirm that unimpressive book club girl was, in fact, unimpressive. And indeed she was. Thus endeth Round 1 of my less-than-stellar dating experience.
Fast forward to last week and, let’s call this one…Virginia. Through a combination of her open sense of humor and my managing to squelch any instinct I had to mess it up, I managed not to scare her off (in 12minds-speak, we call this Stage 1). I then moved on to laying down the groundwork (Stage 2) which generally consists of jokes, advice, and showering/shaving on a regular basis so as to seem clean and well-dressed. Stage 3 is the difficult one because it consists of manning up and asking the girl out. So I totally did and managed to do it clean shaven, without any comments regarding boobs, and articulately (i.e., complete sentences that, for the most part, make sense).
She says yes. After walking away I throw up my arms in victory and, no lie, promptly walk into a glass door. Luckily, she did not see this.
We go downtown to a posh-y type bar where we start with the drinking and conversation. She looks nervous, but so am I. We’re a bottle of wine deep into drinks when I decide to just be honest with her and tell her that I actually like-like her. (Yes, I’m in 5th grade, thanks.) I actually had this awesome speech planned out and it ended up pretty well, I think. It was a nice mixture of sweet, honest, and cute. After that endearing speech, how can she NOT want to make out with me?
Let me share with you how, exactly, she can not want to make out with me after that speech.
She smiles a really sweet smile, looks conflicted…and then proceeds to tell me that she’s a lesbian. Now, my worst case scenario was the “just friends” speech. I was prepared for that situation and am personally of a strong belief that while you cannot make someone love you, sometimes all you can do is stalk them, hope they panic, and give in. The “what to do if she likes women as much as I do” scenario was not, however, on my list. Much like after the first A-bomb explosion back in the 40s, the world will never be the same again.
“Oh, you like Harry Potter books, too? That’s great! We have so much in common! Do you like women, too? Do we also have that in common?”
At this stage in the game, I’m pretty convinced that I will never make out with a girl for the rest of my life.