THE STRAW

What was the straw that broke the camel’s back that led me to splendid hibernation? Listen my friends and you shall hear…

I gotta tell ya, this one really baffled me. It all started about a year ago. I found her online. She was attractive, self supportive, a recent divorcee with three kids, and even Jewish. We graduated from emails to phone calls to first date fairly quickly. I honestly didn’t expect much. We had some drinks, light apps, and saw a movie. Well, part of a movie. She couldn’t take the violence of The Departed so we walked out. I suppose that should have been a sign. But she was nice and we got along so it led to a rare second date.

The second date was nice. We actually sat through an entire movie this time, and we had dinner and got to know each other better. During our dinner conversation, it became clear to me that she was not mentally over her divorce yet. She told me she wasn’t ready to have a man come to her house, even just to pick her up. So my take-away here was that at this stage of the game, she wasn’t ready and I needed to give her time to figure herself out.

Fast forward the clock 10 months. I stumbled upon her online profile and decided I’d say hi. She replied back and we agreed we wanted to catch up. Ironically, right after the whole Dallas thing blew up, she called me out of the blue. We had a nice chat. She told me she just had some surgery done and that she wouldn’t be able to go out until the following week. Fair enough. I flew home that Friday and when I landed, I had a voice mail from her. She told me she was feeling a little better and to call her. I called her up and she told me she’d been stuck in her house due to the surgery and she asked me to come over. OK, it was already 9 pm and I needed to go home and change but what the hell. I told her I could make it by 10. She told me she had a secret but wouldn’t tell me until I got there.

She greeted me in her driveway clad in her pajamas. I didn’t hug her because she was sore from the surgery. We went into the house and the first thing she asked me to do was help her reposition the futon from couch to bed so she could be more comfortable. At first we sat up and chatted about her surgery. I think the correct term was umbilical hernia. She had asked me if I was squeamish and I told her that medical grossness wasn’t my strong suite but that I’d made it through Andy’s birth without passing out. And so, she proceeded to show me her scars. Now, in order for her to do that, she had to slide her pj bottoms down off her hips toward her you-know-what. I didn’t see “it” but think about it, there’s not much space between her crotch and her vagina, right? So I saw the scars and I thought sitting there looking at her scars was slightly weird. As if that wasn’t weird enough, she then told me about her little secret.

She got an upgrade. She told me she wanted her boobs back after three pregnancies. So she slid her top up and out so I could see her other scars. I didn’t’ get a full view of her new beauties, but I got an occluded view from the bottom up. She looked good and I told her so. She sat back up and we talked some more, and she asked me a point blank question. Now I at this point, I hadn’t realized I’d lost her but her question to me made me realize her disappointment in me. She asked me where was the guy who wrote the profile online because she thought I was different from that guy. The question threw me as did, I guess, the possible reason for me sitting there in the first place. I guess in her mind, she was looking for the wild and crazy guy who threw caution to the wind. And clearly, I hadn’t showed her that side of me for a myriad of reasons. Let’s take a step back here for a second.

A year ago, this woman was not even interested in dating and couldn’t have a man even drive to her house to pick her up. And now here I am on her bed looking at her private parts. I really thought the whole thing was innocent, but once again I think I misread the entire situation and I guess she was disappointed. We lay down on the bed on our backs next to each other and I proceeded to tell her a few ‘Plantation’ stories of the guy I guess she was looking for. I tried to prove to her that the guy did exist, but that I simply felt this was not the time and place for me to jump on her considering where she was a year ago and what little I knew of her since then.

I was there for around two hours and I told her I’d call her during the week to check up on her and to see if she was read to go out. I called her twice and text’d her twice. No response. And that, ladies and gentlemen, was the proverbial straw. I guess she really wanted me to make some sexual advances to her. Who knew? Obviously, I certainly didn’t have a clue. Sure, you read the story here and think, “How could you miss all those signs?” Believe me, if I felt there was an opportunity, I surely would have taken it. But given our previous past and my respect for her, it honestly never entered my mind. Game over.

She even mentioned to me as she questioned me that she liked ‘bad boy’ types. Man, have I heard that a lot this year. Thing is ladies, you like bad boy types and then you bitch about how shitty men treat you. I’m starting not to feel sorry for you any more. You can’t have your cake and eat it too. Either we’re too nice or too bad. I guess I can’t win either way. I walk away from the dating scene this year as frustrated and confused as ever to the point where I’ve totally lost interest in trying. Next year is going to be a different year. For many reasons. But more on that later.