Monday, June 27, 2011

date #21: follies

ahem... read this:

Hello Amber,
   Just wanted to contact you about your project. My son was born in 1982 and is in your age cat. He is a graphic artist and runs his own company. You can contact him through me any time this month. His free time is limited. Also, from my corner if you find nothing to do near the end of this month there is a national chess tournament in Stillwater, OK. May 27 to 30 with some of the strongest chess players in the world. The cash prizes aren't that great but afterall this is not a Vegas event when the first prize is usually at least $100K.  Regards, W.R.W(Wichita Falls)
    P.S. - My son lives in Austin.

(i wrote back saying that we had already set up a date and that i didn't think that long of a road trip was feasible. i received another reply...)

Amber,
   I didn't know he already contacted you. Run with it. With me you would basically be bored unless you like spending money gambling. However, Matt is your age and was educated at Baylor, U.of Houston and Savannah School of Graphics and Art Design in Georgia. Like I said he runs a start-up and has 2 other part-time jobs so he is high energy. Although he is half Latino, my friends say his skin looks like he is Italian. If something does develop and you end up in the family, I am giving you an advance on getting through the process. You have a choice of Christian denoms- Disciples of Christ, Baptist, Catholic, Messiah Judism, and several other misc. ones. Regards, W.R.W(Wichita Falls)/ Retired Pharmacist

...

are you... wait... is this serious? or do you have one hell of a sense of humor? i read it over again and again in between rolling on the floor in fits of laughter. did my date know that his dad was writing me? will he be embarrassed when he finds out? he shouldn't be. even through it's hilarity, i wasn't judging him based on his father's words... but i sure was creating a comical cartoon character depiction in my imagination. for some reason he was short and round, Danny DeVito style, with a cigar dangling from his crooked but inviting smile. i'm not sure where the association with the cigar came from; maybe it was the mention of Vegas. imagine Coolidge's dog painting series only this new scene is called "dogs and DeVito playing chess".

look, enough about the dog okay? (if you get that reference, you deserve hugs.) on to the date:
so what makes a guy think that swimming is a good suggestion for a first date? there's no way i would say "hey guy that i don't know, take a good, long look at my nearly naked body! here i am!" i understand that any time you go swimming, there are a bunch of people that you don't know that have the chance to look at you, but they are more than likely going to stay strangers. you're not spending a copious amount of time with them and trying to form some sort of bond. you can pretend they don't exist... they're just extras in your story, not any of the main characters. maybe i'm just old-fashioned in that sense. it takes a while to earn the layers of my clothing coming off.

so i ruled out the very un-Miss-America pageant idea, i said no to the 3-D movie awkward yawn-a-thon that would've taken place on two opposite ends of the couch in his apartment, and unfortunately i even had to cut out another one of his suggestions: a craft fair that i think he chose specifically trying to suit my tastes. i've realized that that sort of thing is really hard to do on the first date. i had this feeling that i would want to pay attention to the creative works and he would be trying to pull me into conversation. plus, i had to work on some things until later in the day and it just wasn't going to work.

but the homemade pizza idea sounded like a great approach to bonding through a shared doing, right? sigh. he didn't even ask if i had ever cooked before; he just started giving me extremely basic instructions. i felt like i was a student taking an introduction to cooking class. at least i learned the proper way to position my fingers when cutting vegetables! that will prove beneficial so that i won't uphold the tradition of the Kellers' stubby fingers. i tried making a joke to that effect, telling him that multiple people on that side of the family have missing pieces of appendages, but i think i freaked him out more than anything. sorry!

so after the delicious pizza (mine ended up looking much more appetizing than his, which i had to tease him about), mashed potatoes, asparagus, and drool-inducing chocolate cake, we headed out to Esther's Follies for our first-ever show there. i had no idea what to expect but it was absolutely brilliant. a mix between a comedy sketch, magic show, and musical is EXACTLY my kind of thing. even the backdrops and props were theatrical, creative, and lively.  and when i experience things like this, i tend to study them in my head long after the show is actually over. i like mulling over details and soaking it all in and i tried explaining that to him once he pulled me outside of the building, but i guess i didn't communicate it well enough. he kept asking me random questions that seemed very trivial at the time. i was really trying to not get annoyed because the fact of the matter is that we're just different... but you know, my head gets very selfish when it wants its personal time. and that's when i knew it was time to go home.

worst part of the date: let me iterate that date #21 is a very nice guy. thoughtful, driven, and incredibly smart... but he's way too structured for me. he had set up an itinerary for the entire night, including how long it would take for us to get from point A to point B and i like flying by the seat of my pants. and acting ridiculously goofy. i didn't feel like i could openly be that around him.
best part of the night: pretending i was watching Saturday Night Live
best part of the date: talking about intelligent, psychological ideas and thoughts during our meal... and  getting me a gorgeous parasol of my favorite color (turquoise) was really thoughtful. i felt guilty taking such a gift though...

3 comments:

  1. If you think better of him for giving you the gift, then all is well. Surely he just wanted to do something nice for you.

    Sounds like his lifestyle (structured) and communication just don't mesh well with yours...ah well.

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  2. agreed. He just tried to be nice to you.

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  3. Also, don't like that you posted his father's name. I would edit that out.

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