Lucky 13

I recently gave speed dating another go. Some of you loyal readers will recall the less than stellar first experience, but if you need a memory refresher, here it is  http://goodlunchstories.blogspot.com/2016/05/speed-dating.html?m=1 

My second experience speed dating was much better than the first, and I have to credit the difference to beer! A local brewery hosted a speed dating event that started with drinking a beer and touring the brewery as a group. The beer serves as a social lubricant, and ladies, realistically, you're just going to get a better crop of men when you offer them beer instead of coffee! 

After we saw where the beer gets brewed, we had a chance to order a second drink and then sat down at four long tables formed into somewhat of a u shape.  Ladies sat on the outside with men on the inside. Men rotated to the right every four minutes for a new date. I had a pleasant experience with everyone and the overall group vibe felt reminiscent of a college party where we were just chilling and meeting new people. It also helped that I went with three female friends. Never go carousing for men without your wing-women! At the end of the official speed date event, we all got to chat unofficially without four minute time constraints while the organizers tallied our interests. The ladies who organized the speed dating event were the wives of the two brewery owners. The wives took all of our official note cards with our date preferences listed on them. They hand wrote the email contact for our matches and then returned our note cards telling us it was now our job to contact the people we liked. 

Although I enjoyed hanging out with everyone, and marked a couple on my notecard, I only followed up with one man who most sparked my interest. Lucky 13. Well, his number was 13, and since my number was 7 we decided that we both had lucky numbers and referred to them thusly. 

When I emailed Lucky 13, it was immediately returned to me by the postmaster as having an invalid address. In their frenzied writing, the brewery wives wrote down an incorrect email. I wasn't sure of a couple digits - is that an 8 or an E? I tried the other variation of his email by changing one of the sloppily written digits, but still had an invalid email address. C'est la vie. I figured it wasn't meant to be. 

A couple weeks went by when I unexpectedly got a Facebook message from Lucky 13. He explained that he had somehow forgotten to write down my number on his notecard that night and he hoped I didn't mind that he looked me up. I didn't mind at all!

When recanting the story to some of my 20-something age friends at the makeup counter, they all cooed about how profoundly romantic it was that he "pursued" me by searching on Facebook. Then they suggested which was the most romantic shade of lipgloss to wear on our date. They also laughed hysterically when I said that we all exchanged email addresses as our contact information. "Email!!! Bwahaha! You're so old!!!"

At that moment I did feel old. Not because I still use email- most grown up professional people use email! But because I grew up in the era of romantic comedies, or rom com's, as we 30 somethings affectionately call them. Rom com's reflected the romantic ideals of the time. Men wrote love letters, bought flowers, stood outside windows with romantic music blaring on their boom boxes, climbed up fire escapes to declare their love to the whore with a heart of gold! (Upon reflection, I'm reconsidering how romantic Pretty Woman might have seemed if it was aptly named, The Businessman and the Whore) And if they would've seen You've Got Mail, they would realize that email is a perfectly suitable communication mode for your romantic interests! (Also, it's not like I still use AOL!)

Lucky 13 is actually a couple years older than I am so he also found their reaction surprising and amusing. I only told him about the reaction to email being antiquated. I didn't feel the need to share at that point about my and the girls' views on his level of romantic pursuit. 

Lucky 13 and I had great conversations, enjoyed watching classic movies, and discovering new hand crafted (AKA over-priced hipster) beverages. I feel like we had a good basis of friendship and there were of course some romantic moments, but he was rarely flirty. The romantic chemistry was less than intense, but I still enjoyed his company. I thought to myself that maybe this is the compromise that married people are always telling me about. He had the important attributes where I could see him being a good husband and father, but not the overwhelming attraction/love at first sight that I'd experienced with a couple others- a couple others who turned out to be horrible jerks who broke my heart! So by that train of thought, I hypothesized that maybe the crazy love at first sight feeling is actually an indicator of an asshole who might eventually break my heart. I'd like to think I'm wrong about that one. 

After a few weeks, things tapered off undramatically. He was busy one week and then we just never made plans after that. Being "busy" was probably his way of letting me down easy. But I'm not broken hearted about this one. I actually wouldn't mind being just friends with him and seeing those old movies that nobody else ever wants to see with me. I haven't figured out a non-awkward way to make that invitation. 

Possible text:  "Hey Lucky 13, I realize by now that you obviously don't want me to be your girlfriend and that's cool. But hey, do you want to catch that Carey Grant movie at the Alamo? I promise not to make out with you at the movie...unless you want to, that's cool, too." 

Moral Of Today's Story:

A.  If you're going to speed date, you should have two very important things: 1. a wing-woman and 2. Alcohol. 

B.  We need more romantic comedies in the world today!

C. In my pursuit of love and marriage, I've decided I'm still going to look for that crazy, head over heels, overwhelmingly-in-love feeling. Maybe it won't be love at first sight, but I want it all. Crazy love + friendship qualities = future husband? I hope so. 

Banter and Burnout

People usually talk about burnout in reference to their work and careers. Psychology Today says that burnout is a state of chronic stress that leads to 

1. Physical and emotional exhaustion, 

2. Cynicism and detachment, 

3. Feelings of ineffectiveness and lack of accomplishment. 

Another quote says: "Burnout reduces productivity and saps your energy, leaving you feeling increasingly helpless, hopeless, cynical, and resentful. Eventually, you may feel like you have nothing more to give."

When you put it that way, I'm definitely suffering from dating burnout! I'm emotionally exhausted, cynical, and I definitely feel ineffective and lacking the accomplishment of finding one non-douchey guy to stick around! 

The problem isn't that it can't or won't happen. The problem is that I'm so over trying! Even when a guy has good potential I don't really want to go through the motions anymore. 

One of the last guys I went out with, let's call him Banter, seemed great. We had great conversations filled with witty banter - hence the name. We could talk on the phone for hours and laugh nearly the whole time. He checked off most of the boxes on my invisible check list.  And he had one of the smoothest lines after our first kiss. He had walked me to my car after our date and surprised me with a tender kiss. With his hand still lightly resting on my hip, he pulled away and said softly, "and then there were sparks." Silver screen moment right there! 

So what was the problem? I told him straight up on our first date that if he fell in love with me and we stayed together for a year that I would likely want to get engaged at that point. I think that was probably the point where I scared him off. 

Why did I tell him that? Because I'm burnt out! Because it's the truth and I'm tired of wasting my time! I might have also made some "no ghosting" rules stating if he wanted to break up with me then he was required to do it verbally - either by phone or in person. I was still reeling from being ghosted by Almost Perfect, but I also feel very strongly that men should live by the moral rule that you don't just disappear and cut off all contact! It's the worst possible way to end things! Anyway, we bantered about relationship rules and expectations and Banter amended the rule saying that there should be a clause citing mandatory breakup hanky panky. I told him I thought that hanky panky was for making up not breaking up, but in the end we agreed upon a set of rules because when you have good banter (ie. communication skills) you can talk anything out! 

I didn't end up going out with Banter again. Both of us had recently suffered breakup wounds, and I think he wanted something casual until he was ready to be serious again while I apparently wanted a guarantee he wouldn't break my heart again. There is no such guarantee in any relationship. 

Moral of Today's Story:

I think dating burnout should be treated like any other kind of burnout. If dating is starting to feel like a job that you'd rather not go to, then clock out for a while. Cut back on how much you "work." Don't get me wrong, I'm still looking for Mr. Right. But it's a hobby, not a job. 

New Year's Advice - What Not To Do

Recently, I chatted with a male friend about how women kind of hate each other-especially white women. His outsider perspective is that Latina women will band together in crisis, Black women will always have each others' backs, but White women just fend for themselves because we basically all hate each other. I don't fully identify with the catty, competitive, narcissistic white woman persona he described, but it got me thinking about the greater sisterhood. 

To be clear, I consider all of my friends and myself to be in the nice girl category where most of us are mature, good-hearted people. Deep down we always want what's best for each other, however, somewhere adjacent to deep down there's also a part of every woman that wants to feel superior. It's difficult to discern which deep down part is doing the talking when we give advice. For example, here are some of the worst bits of advice or commentary I've received as a single woman. 

1. The attempted setup.  "I wonder who I can set you up with. I'll ask my husband if he has any friends."  

He doesn't. That's why we have this same conversation verbatim at least every three

months. 

2. They point out any living, breathing male, in case you're blind and/or too stupid to notice men in general. 

"Hey, did you hear that?! That guy is 39! He's in your age range." That is literally all we know about him- oh and that he delivers guacamole with extra chips upon request. 

"Hey, did you hear [male friend] say that he's moving two hours away and will have a roommate? His roommate must be single if [male friend] is moving in! You should date him!" This is literally the dumbest suggestion anyone has EVER made to me. First of all, it is possible that he could concurrently have a girlfriend AND a roommate. Second of all, I would need more information than "there is a male who owns a house" before I would attempt to strike up a long distance relationship with some rando!

3. They tell me I'm too picky/not picky enough

"You have a romanticized ideal in your head and you'll just give anybody a chance because you think he'll turn out to be a knight in shining armor."

"You're judgmental and you'll write somebody off without getting to know him just because you don't think he's your type."

Every person who has ever accused me of being too picky has also criticized me for dating some schmuck who wasn't good enough for me! I can't be simultaneously too picky AND not picky enough, can I?!These are the times I think people just say things because they want to seem like they know better than you. They usually don't. 

4. My least favorite quip is, "you never know"

Truth is you probably do know. I hear this quip when someone suggests I could fall in love with someone I've known as a friend/acquaintance for several years already and have literally never been interested in or attracted to him. To test this logic, a few years ago I embraced the philosophy that if you're single you, shouldn't have a type because (read with ominously dorky voice) "you never know!"

I dated every guy who showed interest in me in my quest to find out if indeed one never knows. I hoped to be pleasantly surprised. I was not. Turns out I actually know myself pretty well and have a fairly good read on other people. Most people do know what they want. And if once upon a time you would've tried suggesting to your now-married friend who's giving you the bad advice that she date the same guy friend she's pushing on you now, you know she wouldn't have gone for him either! Not because he's a bad guy but because you don't need another person to tell you to be interested in someone!

After dating dozens of men during my "singles should have no type" era, I concluded that the "you never know" philosophy only holds true for two types of women. One type being the very young and inexperienced women who simply don't know anything yet. The other would be a truly stupid woman who somehow didn't notice that the love of her life was right in front of her all along! (You might know this woman as she's actually been the central character in every Hallmark movie ever made!)

More gems of wisdom:

5. "Have you ever considered online dating?"

No, It's 2018 and I've somehow never heard of it!

6. "Have you prayed about it?"

Yes, for the past couple decades. Basically, since I had my first crush. I do believe God directs our steps, but He's not a husband granting genie. 

7. Maybe God's just not done perfecting you yet, and that's why you haven't met your husband."  

No, that can't be it because you're married and clearly imperfect-- I mean, did you even hear yourself on that last statement??

8. Some of you are still thinking about the male friend I mentioned at the beginning of this post. If you're wondering if he might turn out to be more than a friend...then go back and re-read point number 4! Seriously, sometimes you do know! Also, part of the reason he has great insight into women because he's not attracted to them 😀

Moral Of Today's Story: 

Sometimes people mean well, but they give terrible advice. You don't need to date that guy who looks like Kim Jong Un just because you're married friends think he's a good catch. Trust yourself. You know more than you think you do--unless you're someone who's been giving the aforementioned advice, you know less than you think you do!

Stepping Stone

We've all heard the old adage that the best way to get over a man is to get under a new one. Well, I decided last week that I was ready to move on from Almost Perfect. I met some interesting fellows at a couple bars downtown while out with one of my best gal pals, and we hung out with a bachelor party during their escapades for a while. Well, the most interesting fellow from that evening turned out to be married- sans ring! So I continued my search by going to the easiest, fastest place to find a date: Tinder. Ugh. I know what everyone thinks of Tinder, and I'm not endorsing it. But seriously everybody is on there. The doctor I dated from Match is on there. I saw a couple guys I know from church on there. Colleagues. Neighbors. Rando's (short for "random guys"). It just happens to be the deepest pool in which to fish. 

So in my effort to move on, I met my Stepping Stone for decaf coffee on a Sunday evening. I let two of my friends know where I was going and gave them his name and pic just in case he tried to kidnap or murder me. You know, safety first. So my friend asked why we were going for coffee instead of cocktails. Didn't I want something to take the edge off? I told her that I like when a man suggests coffee because for one thing I'm not a nervous dater and as much as I love tequila I don't need it as a social lubricant. Secondly, I find that a man who buys you coffee has no expectation of your potentially getting drunk upon your first meeting and subsequently trying to take you home that night. Coffee is unassuming. 

Anyway, I scheduled my date with Stepping Stone for an hour since I had dinner plans with a friend that evening as well.  He offered to meet me on my side of town, but I picked a place near his neighborhood since I was also meeting my friend near there later. He was a few minutes late and texted me a couple times about exactly where the coffee shop was located. I discovered that he'd only been in Omaha for about 4 months so he didn't quite have the lay of the land yet. 

We chatted about our families, interests, and hobbies. Basically the typical get to know you first date stuff, seeing if we had things in common. I had mentioned that I went to church that morning and asked if he attended church anywhere. He said he went to Alcoholics Anonymous and they had a spiritual side to their program....um, that's great but not exactly what I meant. He did say that he'd gone to a church for a while in another state before he moved back, and he just hadn't really looked for one in town yet. I guess being just 60 days sober perhaps he was preoccupied. 

During our date, I happened to run into not just one but two of my coworkers! Separately. One of them being one of my bosses. Just what I want on a blind date. Oh well. My social life isn't exactly a secret. 

After a short while, Stepping Stone said he didn't want to make me late to meet my friend. Without realizing my opportunity to leave a boring date, I said I didn't need to leave for another 15 minutes. Then it occurred to me that maybe he was bored, too! Anyway, we made small talk for another 15 minutes and then I dismissed myself to get going. 

He asked me out again for the next weekend, and out of politeness I said yes. Maybe he wasn't as bored as I was! He texted me a few times during the week until I finally told him that although he seemed like a nice guy I just didn't feel a connection and I didn't want to waste his time. He thanked me for my honesty. 

Moral of Today's Story:

I don't how much going out with men I don't like actually helps to forget the one who broke my heart. But I can put Almost Perfect a little further in the past because he's no longer the last person I went on a date with. Maybe I didn't get closure from Almost Perfect, but I'm choosing to move forward and nobody can rob me of that. 

Giant Murse

Last Fall, I dated a type of man I'd already sworn off. A foreign man. An African man. I had sworn off all foreign men based on some of my own as well as some of my friend's experiences. But sometimes when you're shopping for men on the internet and you see things like 6'6" you can't fight the impulse to swipe right. One of my weaknesses is gigantically tall men. Other types of mine include: NBA sized men, football player builds, hot nerdy athletes, sexy computer geeks, authoritative business types, and male nurses. 

I know. That last one surprised me, too. But I had previously discovered there's something very attractive about a strong man who knows how to care for someone. Not to mention he specializes in anatomy and bedside manner! This man was both gigantically tall and a male nurse. 

Anyway, I went out with my Giant Murse and we had a nice time. He wasn't smooth like a lot of "player" types I'd known, but he was sweet, sincere and romantic. I was hesitant to get too involved because of cultural differences, and I told him so. I explained that I'd dated an African man before who didn't treat women with the respect I expected in a relationship. He understood my desire to take things slow and so we did. 

After a few weeks, Giant Murse and I had the DTR (Define The Relationship) talk and we were officially boyfriend and girlfriend! Things went pretty well for a while. He cooked for me. He bought me a "just because" gift. He helped with a disgusting critter situation at home once. We even dressed in matching couples costumes for Halloween, which was a relationship bucket list item for me. Then his mother decided to come from Nigeria for a spontaneous 3 week visit! Dun, dun, dun...

Apparently, Giant Murse's mother thought that he had been a bachelor for too long and that she needed to come arrange for him to meet some nice African girls here in the States. When she arrived, he told her about me and that he would decide for himself who he would date. Yeah, you tell her!

We really weren't at a "meet the family" point yet, but since she was staying with him I thought I should at least say hello once. He didn't think that was a good idea. I got the feeling she would see me as some white, American hussy trying to corrupt her son. 

While she was staying, he had to drive her around places, amend his schedule to accommodate her, and he even cut our dates short because she would be waiting up until he got home! When you're dating a 33 year old man, curfew is not something you expect to be an issue! 

He also had his nursing board exam coming up (he was making a career change and had just finished nursing school), and he dealt with A LOT of anxiety about that test. Between studying for the exam and carting around his mother, he basically had no time for me. He kept telling me things would be better when he was done with the test. Then he took the test, but had to wait two days to get the results. He wouldn't even see me in the two days before he got the results! He said he'd still be too anxious and didn't want to celebrate if he didn't know he passed. Never mind that I'm over here just being the supportive but neglected girlfriend! 

Then he got the results -- he passed! Yay! Happy days are here again! Giant Murse was an official nurse! But he wanted to wait until his mom left town to get together again! Two more days. 

Then radio silence. I didn't hear from him. He didn't respond to texts or voicemails. After a few very frustrating days, I told him that if I didn't hear from him by the end of the day I would take it as his way of breaking up with me. 

Still nothing.

A small part of me was concerned that all the anxiety he'd been dealing with had gotten the best of him and that he'd had some sort of meltdown, but he finally did text me two weeks later. He didn't have a good reason for not contacting me. Basically his anxiety had indeed gotten the better of him. He had told me before that when he was overwhelmed or stressed he tended to just shut everybody out and not respond to anyone at all. I told him that's not ok with me if he wants to be in a relationship. We texted a couple times over the next few months mostly just checking in, seeing how the other person is doing. He never really tried to get back with me though. I'm both surprised and offended by that, but I think it was for the best. 

Moral Of Today's Story:

1. Be leery of a mama's boy who won't let you near her. Mother's love me! We don't need to have dinner or go shopping together when our dating relationship has just started, but a simple meet and greet when she's staying WITH YOU might be appropriate. 
2. It's just not ok to stop communicating. Use your words! 
3. Perhaps I should trust my instincts that made me reluctant in the first place. Then I won't be kicking myself and saying "I told me so" later. 

Almost Perfect

When I started this blog a couple years ago, I had a plethora of comically awful dates that made for great stories. And you loyal readers know my motto- "there's no such thing as a bad date, just good dates and good lunch stories."  Well I've had a lot of good dates in the past year or so, but still no happy ending. Unfortunately, when the dates are good but the ending is bad it's not always a story I want to tell. 

My latest failed romance with Almost Perfect started off in storybook fashion at a costume party with dancing and drinks and even celebrating our one hour anniversary with a kiss under the disco ball. For weeks, I had fantastic dates with this charming and gallant man. I felt like the leading lady in a silver screen romance! In fact, I'm not going to go into detail now, but our times together we're so memorable that my writing energies for that month went into documenting our "love story" which would've probably been a self-published book given as my sappy groom's gift at our wedding one day. I could easily picture us growing old together. 

Ok, so you're starting to get the picture that I fell hard and fast for this guy. He truly epitomized everything I'd been looking for over the past three decades! He was sweet and considerate, irreverently funny, handsome, professional, we had complimentary features that made us look good as a couple, we shared values, ideals, and interests, etc, etc... I knew Almost Perfect wasn't perfect, but he was perfect for me.

In past relationships, I've usually had some level of reservations or concerns over things that I knew probably wouldn't play out ideally, but with Almost Perfect I had no inkling of our untimely and unfortunate ending. He showed no signs of douchebaggery. He called on the phone  rather than just texting like so many douchebags do. He made plans with me and carved out time in his hectic schedule to prioritize me. He was there for me when I had a stressful day and took me out to eat and drink whatever I wanted. He appreciated my domesticity which made me feel valued for doing things I like to do. He didn't get angry easily even when I accidentally broke a light fixture at his house. He was kind and courteous to wait staff, and generously tipped, too! (I once saw him discreetly over-tip our waitress when he found out that another table stiffed her.)  He introduced me to his friends. He met some of mine. He pursued me. Until he apparently hit the wall and lost all interest in and remembrance of me.

At one point after I had infected him with a nasty stomach flu that I'd had the week before, I hadn't seen him for a couple days. Now he was busy with work and a lot of projects so it wasn't atypical to go a few days without seeing him, but he had always been great about calling me back and making plans to see me again. So I called him on a Wednesday afternoon, and he answered and talked to me for less than a minute. He pleasantly said he was in the middle of about ten things and that he would call me back shortly...that was the last I heard from him. It's been four weeks now. 

I have no idea how this Almost Perfect man went from wonderful to MIA with no explanation. I was in shock and denial for the first couple days. They say that the five stages of grief - Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance -  apply to all sorts of losses, but my breakup stages of grief are best measured in units of alcohol, minutes spent on "revenge body" workouts, number of emotional eating binges before and/or after revenge workout, and the volume of sad Toni Braxton songs played on repeat. (Unbreak My Heart speaks to me on a pathetically personal level)

I loved Almost Perfect. I think I fell in love with him on our first date, which was a crazy good story that perhaps I'll tell another time. At first it was hard to be mad at him or hate him when all of my memories of him are good. I am mad at him now for how he took the cowards way of ending things. Somehow our culture has made it acceptable to men to "ghost" when they no longer want to put in the effort a relationship takes. I texted him the day after he said he would call me back figuring he just got busy with work stuff. Then I texted again two days later. By five days later I left him a voicemail calmly stating that I felt he owed me an explanation for why I hadn't heard from him in five days and requested that he call me back. 

Obviously, I still haven't heard anything. My friends who always have my back in a time of crisis checked for his obituary in the paper/internet since death or coma would've been the only acceptable reasons for him to disappear. At least I can say I'm fortunate to have a lot of people who care about me and I've received a variety of sympathy, tough love, and mostly good advice. I've heard a lot of "it's his loss," which is true because I'm fabulous! But I'm the one who was left to grieve the loss. Some friends have wanted so badly to make me feel better and give me advice so that I'd never hurt again, but if you're not willing to risk hurt I don't think you can find love. 

Moral Of Today's Story:

I have no regrets. I ascribe to Alfred Lord Tennyson's belief that it's better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all. I will be cautious, of course, not to have my heart broken again, but I don't want to love out of just part of my wounded heart. Since I'm into cheesy quotes today, I'll borrow from William Purkey and say my next chapter goals are to dance like no one is watching, love like I'll never be hurt, sing like no one is listening, and live like it's heaven on earth. 

Not a chauvinist. Not a slacker. Where are those guys?

If you've been on the internet lately or turned on a tv, you've probably seen a good deal of memes and stories about women. Women play half the roles in world history, and I'm glad to see the increase in news stories about female successes in numerous arenas. Amid the cries for equality, however, I keep hearing complaints lately about chauvinistic men. Men who want their women to stay and not work. Men who think she should be home to cook and clean. Men living in the past and thinking it's still the 1950's. Men who have the gall to be the sole provider and take care of their families. And I think to myself, "Where are those men?"

Now, don't misunderstand me. I worked hard for my degrees, and I consider myself blessed to be an educated woman working in my chosen field and supporting myself. When I cook, it's because I want to cook. If I don't feel like it, nobody is upset. When I pick up dirty socks off the floor, they're mine that I dropped there yesterday after the gym. I go out when I want to, and I stay in when I want to. I fully appreciate the advantages of my single life, and I'm not looking for someone to take away all my freedom.

But seriously, where are the traditional men? The men who want marriage rather than hookups? The men who want to provide for their family? Not in a sugar daddy kind of way where I'm lying around in an expensive negligee eating bon-bon's at home while he's out earning a living, but in a "let's build a life together" kind of way. Where are the men who appreciate that I want and like to cook you a nice meal? The men who look around their bachelor's apartments and think "this place could use a woman's touch?" 

I'm not looking for a chauvinist who thinks he's smarter than me because he has a penis. I have met one or two of those. But why is the only other option a millennial mama's boy who can't get his act together?!

Perhaps we've confused the men by being too independent. We told them that we can take care of ourselves so we don't need them. In recent years there's been a far higher number of women going to college versus men and that's intimidating to some men. Now we've got a bunch of intelligent career minded women in the workplace and if they're fishing for a similarly educated man, there's a much smaller pool. Of course, degrees and education aren't job specific for the role of "significant other" but being skilled at something is an attractive quality. I'm not looking to be anybody's sugar mama either!

Moral of Today's Story: 

I don't need a man, but I'd like a man. Not a chauvinist and not a slacker. I'm a modern day June Cleaver looking for my Ward. My life is pretty fabulous as it is, and I'm going to need someone who is also fabulous on his own to take the job. I'm just not sure where he is.