A Lady's Romantic Endeavors Take a Tragic Turn, Act 140

On Friday I went on a date, which I like saying because it sounds cool. In reality it was not that hot. For one thing, me and this guy went on our first date right around Thanksgiving and we went on our second date Friday night. That doesn't offer a lot of hope for the potential for progress, which by this point is pretty okay with me, although in the long, cold nights that followed date #1 it was decidedly not okay. Date #1 went well in all possible ways, and then my phone remained eerily silent for a week, and I reacted by employing the anticipated behavior of the lead actress in every horrible romantic comedy set in New York, namely lamenting to all my friends individually, at spin classes and over skim mocha lattes, about how we'd had SUCH A GREAT TIME WHY DIDN'T HE CALL.

In honesty I don't go to spin classes. I talk a lot on gchat, which is less frequently featured in romantic comedies because it's not interesting to watch, unless the other person says something really funny right before my boss comes up to my desk.

Eventually, out of exasperation more than anything else, I texted the guy in question, and he responded, and we had a couple aimless conversations over text message that employed liberal use of the letters "lol" even though nothing particularly funny was said, and then finally I bumped into him at a party. And if you think that I did not make an effort in the arenas of exfoliation and hair removal at the prospect of bumping into this guy at some party, you are totally unappreciative of the level at which I'm operating. I also loosened myself up for our reunion by imbibing enough champagne to feel it was appropriate/relevant/interesting to point out that I'd worn shoes that matched my bag but that I secretly wished I'd worn heels. He told me he'd have liked me better if I wore heels and I told him I'd like him better if he were taller and we both had a good, boozy laugh.

The heels comment notwithstanding (because I think it was supposed to be a joke), he seemed thrilled to see me. He seemed, in fact, annoyingly thrilled to see me. He kept telling me how thrilled he was to see me, until finally I said, a bit snappily, "You know, if you'd wanted to see me, you could have called me." And then it got kind of awkward until we started making out.

So a few rounds of text-tag later, we were off on our second date. I did a LOT of exfoliation and hair removal beforehand, and I wore this sick yellow leather miniskirt I bought secondhand, with a a turquoise necklace I got in Morocco, and I met him at a Lower East Side bar and the whole thing was kind of awful. He didn't even mention the skirt. The conversation was stunted, and I am pretty good at making conversation with almost anybody (for reference you can ask any openly insane person riding the Q train) but I felt as though he had once been taught how to have a conversation and had been using that formula with some success for the ensuing thirty years. We talked about travel and he mentioned a recent trip he'd taken to Vegas with his buddies, because they went to Vegas together once a year, and he was getting a bit bored of Vegas. I asked where he would like to go on his next vacation and he said he'd probably go back to Vegas. That is the type of logic I sincerely cannot wrap my head around.

"I think he's maybe just totally flat and boring," I said to Phil the next day. We were on the phone discussing Phil's latest book, which I am copyediting and you should buy.

"He sounds like he has no imagination whatsoever," Phil said.

"I think that maybe he doesn't," I said. "Like, I do stuff. Interesting things happen to me. I have stories and anecdotes and opinions. But I don't get that he has any of those things." You might wonder how I missed this notion while I spent the past two months pining away over this dude, and all I can say is that he is also despicably handsome, which may have colored my initial impressions.

"Well, what did you guys talk about?"

"Nothing, really. He talks about work, and his commute, and bars and stuff... I guess that's it."

"Vegas is a vacation spot for people who have no imagination," Phil opined. "You don't have to think up anything on your own, because everything is laid right out for you. Someone who vacations there year after year, without going anywhere else, is not capable of dreaming up an idea on their own."

"You may be right," I said. "All of our conversations really went nowhere, no matter how hard I tried."

"Do you think he could have Asperger's?"

"It wouldn't really surprise me," I said. "But I diagnose just about every guy I date with Asperger's, which means that either I'm over-diagnosing it, or that is my Type."

"Well," said Phil, "at least you know what you're looking for." I started humming Another One Bites the Dust by Queen, until Phil turned the conversation back to more pressing matters, namely, his underuse of semicolons in Chapter Three. That was a conversation in which both parties contributed, ideas were shared and built upon, and my opinion was encouraged and respected even though I was secretly wearing flats. So at least I have literature to keep me warm.