Chapter 2

That evening, Josh asked if would like to come over to his place and hang out for a bit. He was exhausted from all the holiday festivities but wanted to see me. Maybe we could just watch some TV. Hang out for a bit. 

Hang out. What did that even mean? With an inward sigh, I already knew. Years of dating had taught me many things, yet there remained an overarching fact that, in the end, most men were exactly the same.

Ok, ok, not all men, blah, I get it, ok? But how many times have you heard stories where the exact same thing happened to you that happened to another woman. Here are a few examples: 

He invited me out for drinks – he was in the mood for cocktails; I should pick out the best spot I could find for the perfect martini. As requested, a cute cocktail bar with exotic sounding libations and tasty snacks. The date went well. The next time we spoke, he said he couldn’t keep going out with me, he wasn’t made of money.

He invited me to a trendy restaurant in a refurbished row home, a bar now standing where nona’s kitchen table would have once been. It was a bit out of the way, but was supposed to have the best pasta in town. Pushing past the throngs of people at the bar waiting for a seat in the downstairs restaurant, he told me he hadn’t reserved a table, what’s the problem with waiting a little while. We stood back to back against fifty other people while he mansplained why he had 22 assault rifles back as his “ranch” outside of the city. “Urban life” wasn’t for him.

He asked me out for drinks. He chose the bar. I ordered a glass of red wine. He got a Coke then announced that he didn’t drink, drinking was boring. He hated bars. In fact, he didn’t even know why he was there. 

Neither did I.

Three dates from an endless cycle. But, as they say, you never know. It was a new year – 2020. This time would be different. I did my eyeliner, changed my underwear and jumped in an Uber. 

His apartment was quintessential 21st century modern urban man – aka it had very little furniture, of which nothing matched, and random piles of books, records and other junk in piles against the walls. Monastic living, sponsored by espresso brown flat pack furniture. He did have a candle lit though, so not a complete animal. 

After inviting me in, he splayed out on the sofa in a recumbent position, exhausted from days of post-New Years merriment. We watched old episodes of IT Crowd on Netflix and made out. Perhaps, he suggested, we could relax even further in his bedroom?

By this time I knew I was out. Whether it was the metal bar protruding from his IKEA futon, digging its way into my side, or the intensity of the overhead recessed lighting, I knew this little escapade was over. He wasn’t the one. 

As the Uber dropped me home I felt both defeated and validated. The same old conversation, running in my head. 

Told you, just like the rest.

You don’t know that yet! He could really be tired. 

Seriously? 

…But what other option do we have? 

I tried to focus on the bright side. I’d managed to have a date on the first two days of the year, 2 for 2. Not too shabby. The next day I had plans to have dinner with Katy for our Christmas exchange that was now way past due. 

Katy was my oldest friend. That being said, if I met her today, I doubt very much that we would make much of a connection. And if you asked her, she would agree. It’s funny how time works, binding you together – too many memories to just walk away. 

Katy was single for years. In fact, looking back, I think she might’ve been single for the better part of the over twenty years I’ve known her. Of course, she dated a few men and women here and there. A sunscreen obsessed skinhead who loved the beach but hated tan lines. A gullible gym bro who believed everything he read online about fitness – if you eat a hamburger each Sunday you’ll lose weight, apparently. And my favorite, a one-time drug addict cum restauranteur who tried to convince her to ditch me, alone, in a CVS in San Diego, ten minutes after we’d arrived from the east coast. 

Her luck turned around though – a few years ago she met her fiance, ten years her junior, while playing beer pong. 

We perched on our barstools at the swank Rittenhouse Hotel bar, sipping comped champagne – thanks to her bartender cousin – toasting a Christmas past and the new year to come. We chatted about her recent trip to Phoenix where she had pet ostriches… and ate ostrich,  updated each other on work happenings, and opened our presents. 

“So, how’s the dating thing going?” she inquired, casually running her finger along the edge of her coupe glass, having noticed my watch seemed to be vibrating more than usual.

“Oh, you know,” I sighed, “same old, same old,” with a shrug.

I told myself I wasn’t going to talk about my dates anymore. All my stories led to disappointing ends. Not only was I sick and tired of telling the same story on repeat, but I was sure that everyone around me felt a little downhearted that I hadn’t managed to find someone. 

I would keep my mouth shut and only divulge when I was categorically sure I had found the one. 

 Of course, I tried this tactic before. It didn’t last. I have a big mouth, secrets are hard. At least, secrets about me, as I have the unfortunate tendency to tell everyone everything, regardless of their interest. This time, however, I was sure to keep this resolution. 

Oh, shit. I told Ryan. 

Ok, well that didn’t count. 

STARTING OFF 2020 BY MEETING A RANDOM DUDE FROM TINDER AT A BAR AT 4PM, I texted. Oops.

Fifteen years earlier, Ryan and I met in the Philly indie party scene, going to dive bars and shows. We lost touch, as is often the case, but reconnected, surprisingly, on Tinder. 

I always thought you were cute, he wrote in one of our early conversations, back in The Strokes age. We picked up as friends right where we left off. 

So much for that resolution.

Katy raised her brow ever so slightly and with a lilt to her voice simply said, “Ok.” 

Ok. Good. 

Wait, there was more. Not good. 

She mused, “You know, over the last year you haven’t really been open to love. You’ve been really negative about it, actually.”

With a flourish, I grabbed my glass, “I have not!” I took a swig. 

“You absolutely have!” she retorted, “You’ve been negative about it all year.” 

My mind started to race. When was I negative? I couldn’t think of a single time. It was just an incredibly dry year. 

After a few one-off dates that led nowhere, I persevered through the winter holidays and reactivated the apps the previous January – it was more depressing than before. Something about the idea of putting my face, my beautiful, beautiful face… ok, my regular, regular face, out there for thousands of men in the Philadelphia area to either swipe left or right, deciding my value, felt demoralizing. Men with bathroom selfies, group pictures from 2007, and fucking fish were the ones who would decide if I was worth it?!? Nope. I was out.

By July, with my birthday fast approaching, I hadn’t been out with a man in almost eight months. Resigned to my fate, I signed back on. Ooh! I found someone right away. He looked kinda cute in an early-40s dad-bod kind of way. His profile said he loved David Bowie. We texted about music and my intense love for 1970s rock icon Johnny Thunders. We clicked – he was funny and we had the same taste. Maybe I could do this whole Tinder thing again.

There were about five bars in Philly where I knew you could smoke. It’s funny to look back. Just fifteen years earlier we partied, night after night, in smoke-filled clubs and bars,  returning home reeking of cigarettes and no one gave it a second thought. Fast forward and even smokers didn’t want to go to smoking bars. The rancid, permeating odor, the brown ceilings, the greying walls and lungs, it all became passé. So why was I in one?

It was another hot July day, raining on and off. The air felt sticky and thick. I was meeting Ian in less than an hour and I couldn’t figure out what to wear. Every first date is like the first day of school. Don’t try too hard, but don’t come off a mess either. If I wear something low cut, will he think I’m easy? If I wear a dress, will he think I’ve put a lot of importance on the date? What if he’s shorter than he claims – shock! – what shoes should I wear? 

In the end, I wore a simple vintage American Apparel gray tank, skinny jeans and my favorite clogs. Those clogs. The ones I wore day in and day out, two years broken in and still as rigid as the day I bought them, but dammit, I adored them. Even if the date didn’t work out, that love was real.

Good thing I had the clogs. 

Pushing through waves of smoke-induced nausea, I balanced on a hard leather stool at the end of the yellowed bar with a growing realization that he wasn’t what he had claimed to be. First, he grew up in a cult. I know! A small sect of about forty people dwelling in the woods of central Pennsylvania, living off the land in a communal setting. And by communal I mean wife swapping. His parents were not his own – merely Kurt and Joan from the “Settlement.” 

After breaking from the cult at 33, (! ) he married the first girl he met, had a couple of kids and now, ten years later, was sitting across from me, chainsmoking, telling me that it wasn’t all that bad, actually.

But the thing that really got me? He didn’t really like David Bowie – didn’t even know his music! He put him in his profile to appear in-the-know. He admitted, just minutes into our conversation, that he just googled any musician or album I mentioned so that he could keep up. I felt betrayed. How could I date an ex-cult member who didn’t even know who Ziggy Stardust was?!

An hour later, as I said thanks for a nice evening and walked away, enveloped in the pungent stench of Marlboro Reds, I reached in my back pocket for my phone. Tinder account terminated.  

And now, with Katy, sipping my second, no wait, my third glass of rosé champagne I recoiled, how was I negative? One can hardly count a smoke-laden outing with a former cult member as me being negative towards love. This wasn’t the first time she made this kind of remark. In fact, her comment was just one of many I would categorize as being given to me in the guise of advice. 

You should go out with Tom’s friend Jeff. Jeff was 37 years old, had never had a girlfriend and lived in his parent’s basement. He was either very gay or very much a serial killer. For all our sakes, I hope it ended up the former. 

You should go out with Mike’s friend Steve. Steve’s interests included dragging mack trucks at strong man competitions, guns, and cocaine.

You should go speed dating. 

You should try to meet someone at the grocery store. 

You should join a group. 

You should be open to love. 

You should, you should, you should. 

This is not to say that I hadn’t had a few brief relationships over the previous few years. Greg was supposed to be the long-awaited true love of my adult life. Four months after professing his undying love, he abruptly broke up with me. 

Aaron and I would go to intimate, off the radar, basement shows and dream of traveling the world together. Six weeks before our first planned trip to Sweden, he declared he didn’t want to see me anymore because I was emotional, impatient, and aggressive. 

Steve showered me with text messages and video calls, treating me to meals out three or four nights a week. All he really wanted was to show me off as his hipster city girlfriend to the guys back in suburban Delaware. 

Eddie destroyed everything.

How was I being negative?

We sat in silence for a minute, admiring the twinkle lights as they bounced off the smoked mirror bar, and as was our way, dropped the subject. After a bit of chatting about the random nonsense of everyday life, we called it a night. I wanted to take the subway, but Katy wouldn’t allow it – always my big sister, she put me in a taxi. 

HEY, MAYBE YOU WANT TO COME OVER AND HANG OUT FOR A BIT? my NYE boy pinged. 

CAN'T TONIGHT, SORRY :(

I finished the evening in classic single girl form, eating chips out of the bag, watching Netflix.