Y and I finally got together for dinner last night, after the many weeks of "hey, let's do dinner" and not being able to find a time. I was no longer wondering why he would want to get dinner (okay, maybe I was a little bit), but basically I hadn't even seen him in some 2 or 3 weeks, let alone go back to the old habits we developed over the summer.
It was a nice dinner; we talked like good friends catching up. He even told me about a girl he went on a date with (it didn't lead anywhere; he never called her again despite saying "I'll call you"). I asked him how things were with M, and things really aren't so good. He said that as an acquaintance, she's okay, but he's lost so much respect for her as a person that he doesn't really want to even be close friends. He said that she lacks all the qualities he would look for in a friend, and he thinks that she always saw him as a safety net: a friend whom she could call whenever she was in trouble. Yet, he felt that she never did anything for him, and was never there when he really needed her.
Hmm ... I'm not sure what would happen with that. I think with school having started, our gang really haven't even hung out very much lately, so maybe things will be okay. By the time we're less busy and all hanging out a lot together, maybe by then, Y and M will have worked out most of their issues. If nothing else, time will have smoothed some things over. Though in all honesty, some of the stuff he said about M, I totally agreed with.
Y also mentioned my blog (the other non-anonymous one). He said that he discovered it one day and was so surprised to see this other side of me. I asked him what he meant by "this other side," and he said that he never knew I had an angry, pissed-off side. He said that it was nice to see that side, but he wondered why I never talk about the things on my blog with him or other people in my friend group. I told him that the opportunity almost never presents itself for me to mention the things I end up writing about in my blog because inevitably we're in a big group, and who wants to hear me gripe about my advisor's dog eating my homework?
Though now that I think about it more, I think the things I write in my blog are thoughts I have that I want to share with someone (anyone), but that I feel selfish expressing in a conversation because I would feel like the conversation would be too me-heavy. The things you share in a conversation with a group of friends (or even one friend), or even the way you present things, are so different than what you would say when given a chance to deliver a monologue.
I think both of my blogs allow me the chance to get on stage and act out my own one-man show without fear of appearing self-centered, talking too much about myself, complaining too much, boring other people, being rude, too self-absorbed, and a whole slew of other things that are deemed negative characteristics.
So I think Y and I are over our friends with benefits stage. It kinda started and ended without our ever talking about anything. It's a little strange to me; I feel like we should have at least acknowledged it, but things seem to be fine between us. It's almost scary that there's no awkwardness (makes me think if there are secret sentiments luring underneath somewhere, in me and in him).
Things on the RC front are going very well, and as a result, I can't seem to find a way to stop spending time with him so that I can finish writing my thesis proposal.
Friday, September 29, 2006
Tuesday, September 26, 2006
racist asian parents
I call my parents once a week, almost always on Sunday nights, but this past Sunday, I forgot. So I called last night, talked to them some about my upcoming thesis proposal, our trip to China, etc. etc. During the entire conversation, I was debating whether or not to tell them about RC. Finally, at the end, after my mom had nagged me enough about all sorts of random things, I blurted out, "mom, I'm seeing someone."
I think, for me, telling my parents about a guy is a definite sign that I am comfortable with how things are, where things are going, and I am ready to face the world with him being associated with me (though not a necessarily defined association). When I was younger, I was deathly afraid of telling my parents about guys because they were so against me dating. Even when Key and I started dating our third year in college, it took me a couple of months AFTER we had made things official to tell my mom and dad. I think all of this stemmed from their adamant disapproval of me dating at such a "young" age, "young" being the asian definition of young.
I am lucky that my parents now encourage me to date and whole-heartedly accept my dating. I know that sounds really weird since I am almost 24 now, but I definitely know of Asian friends my age whose parents still frown on their dating, which I think is absolutely ridiculous and close-minded. So anyways, my point here is that I think I am going along a comfortable path with RC, enough so that I told my parents about him.
I don't have a good track record of dating Asian guys (I generally don't), so one of the first things my parents always ask when I tell them I'm dating someone is "What's his race?" They don't care that much: white, asian, half asian, even Brazilian are okay (the Brazilian was okay because I assured my mother that he is very fair-skinned looks like he's white). I rarely ever stray outside of white, asian, half-asian, anyways.
Well, RC is half white, half American Indian. When I told my mom, she immediately became alarmed, and the ignorant questions poured in: "how dark is he?" "does he look black?" "Indians look black you know?" "I bet his mom is really dark" etc. etc. etc.
I tried to placate my mom by saying, "Well, Indians were once Asian; they came over across Alaska, so really RC has Asian roots." That didn't work so well. She insisted that I tell her how dark RC is, so I told her that RC is about the same color as I am when I am tan during the summer. That was probably not the right thing to say; I probably should have just left it at "he's about the same as me." My mom further freaked out when I compared RC to my summer tan, "oh my god, you are SO dark when you get tan in the summer. That is too dark. I don't approve."
She flat out said, "I don't approve." I was speechless. I kinda knew this conversation was coming, and had I given things more thought, I wouldn't have brought it up this early. The conversation then led to all the races I absolutely cannot date. "Well, at least half Native American is better than Black," my mom told me.
I decided to fight back a little because I was getting more and more angry the more she talked, "So what if I dated someone black? Would that really be the end of the world?" I asked.
My mother flipped. "Blacks are absolutely unacceptable. I will not allow it," she said. Then she added, "Indians, too. No Indians. You hear?"
I left the conversation at that because I knew this to be something my mother and I would never be able to see eye-to-eye on. It is times like this that I am glad I never told my mom about the Mozambique guy whom I dated in college. I actually really liked that guy, but I never told my parents about him because I knew the race issue would never fly. I didn't really see long-term potential with him, so I decided it was a battle better left un-fought.
The conversation with my mom yesterday ended with her highly encouraging me to send her a picture of RC. "When you get a chance, find a picture of him and send it to me. I need to see how dark he is." I have some pictures from our mutual friend's wedding (where RC and I met), but I don't really like those pictures of him, so I'm hesitant to send them. With certain people, you send the bad pictures of your friend/date so that their opinion of the person can only get better with time. With my mother, I have to absolutely send the best picture and try to win her over on the first try. If she decides that she does not like a person by his picture, his chances of ever getting on her good side would be forever slim-to-none.
I think, for me, telling my parents about a guy is a definite sign that I am comfortable with how things are, where things are going, and I am ready to face the world with him being associated with me (though not a necessarily defined association). When I was younger, I was deathly afraid of telling my parents about guys because they were so against me dating. Even when Key and I started dating our third year in college, it took me a couple of months AFTER we had made things official to tell my mom and dad. I think all of this stemmed from their adamant disapproval of me dating at such a "young" age, "young" being the asian definition of young.
I am lucky that my parents now encourage me to date and whole-heartedly accept my dating. I know that sounds really weird since I am almost 24 now, but I definitely know of Asian friends my age whose parents still frown on their dating, which I think is absolutely ridiculous and close-minded. So anyways, my point here is that I think I am going along a comfortable path with RC, enough so that I told my parents about him.
I don't have a good track record of dating Asian guys (I generally don't), so one of the first things my parents always ask when I tell them I'm dating someone is "What's his race?" They don't care that much: white, asian, half asian, even Brazilian are okay (the Brazilian was okay because I assured my mother that he is very fair-skinned looks like he's white). I rarely ever stray outside of white, asian, half-asian, anyways.
Well, RC is half white, half American Indian. When I told my mom, she immediately became alarmed, and the ignorant questions poured in: "how dark is he?" "does he look black?" "Indians look black you know?" "I bet his mom is really dark" etc. etc. etc.
I tried to placate my mom by saying, "Well, Indians were once Asian; they came over across Alaska, so really RC has Asian roots." That didn't work so well. She insisted that I tell her how dark RC is, so I told her that RC is about the same color as I am when I am tan during the summer. That was probably not the right thing to say; I probably should have just left it at "he's about the same as me." My mom further freaked out when I compared RC to my summer tan, "oh my god, you are SO dark when you get tan in the summer. That is too dark. I don't approve."
She flat out said, "I don't approve." I was speechless. I kinda knew this conversation was coming, and had I given things more thought, I wouldn't have brought it up this early. The conversation then led to all the races I absolutely cannot date. "Well, at least half Native American is better than Black," my mom told me.
I decided to fight back a little because I was getting more and more angry the more she talked, "So what if I dated someone black? Would that really be the end of the world?" I asked.
My mother flipped. "Blacks are absolutely unacceptable. I will not allow it," she said. Then she added, "Indians, too. No Indians. You hear?"
I left the conversation at that because I knew this to be something my mother and I would never be able to see eye-to-eye on. It is times like this that I am glad I never told my mom about the Mozambique guy whom I dated in college. I actually really liked that guy, but I never told my parents about him because I knew the race issue would never fly. I didn't really see long-term potential with him, so I decided it was a battle better left un-fought.
The conversation with my mom yesterday ended with her highly encouraging me to send her a picture of RC. "When you get a chance, find a picture of him and send it to me. I need to see how dark he is." I have some pictures from our mutual friend's wedding (where RC and I met), but I don't really like those pictures of him, so I'm hesitant to send them. With certain people, you send the bad pictures of your friend/date so that their opinion of the person can only get better with time. With my mother, I have to absolutely send the best picture and try to win her over on the first try. If she decides that she does not like a person by his picture, his chances of ever getting on her good side would be forever slim-to-none.
Sunday, September 24, 2006
now what?
Irish, when he came back from Ireland, switched labs to continue his PhD. Coincidentally, he switched into the same lab that RC is in. Last Friday night, RC mentioned that he had given Irish a ride home from lab, and Irish had invited him to a BBQ. RC said that he couldn't go because he already had plans, but didn't further specify (RC and I were going to a jazz club that night). When RC was telling me this story, he mentioned that he didn't know whether or not to mention that he actually had plans with me, because he didn't know if Irish knows we are dating. (RC knows that Irish and I are good friends).
I don't think I was purposefully keeping the news about me & RC away from Irish. The topic never came up in conversation, though I have to admit that I wasn't exactly trying to steer conversation in that direction either. So, after what RC said, I decided to tell Irish about RC and me. Last night, Irish and I were both hanging out a friend's apartment and having a pretty chill evening. When I drove him home afterwards, I told him that RC and I are dating.
That prompted Irish to say that he was glad I mentioned something because it would allow him a chance to say something, too. Here, my heart fluttered for a second because I thought he was going to say that he'd been dating someone, too, which I knew would make me feel sad. Instead, he said that he felt like some of the stuff he's said or has done since coming back from Ireland may have given me the false impression that he was doing them out of something more than friendship, he wanted to make sure I knew that his motivations were purely those of just-a-friend.
My heart still sank upon hearing this. I'd always felt that Irish would always be there for me, and here he was telling me essentially that he's over me and wants to purely be "just friends", closing the door on anything more.
Then he asked me if I ever misinterpretted his actions and thought that they stemmed from somewhere beyond plain friendship. I had to admit to him that I did. I mean, he brought me back gorgeous silver Celtic earrings from Ireland, for crying out loud. That's not something a "just friends" male friend would give a girl; it's more along the lines of what a brother or a boyfriend would give. I'm not sure how the conversation proceeded from there, but we ended up talking until 5:30am about us. Here is the stuff I remember:
1) He really likes me, and there has always been a gray area between friendship and wanting something more in his mind. He thought that when we decided to just be friends back in March, that this conversation would never come up again because he always thought I only wanted friendship, which was why his actions from there on out were focused completely on friendship and he wanted to make sure that I would see them only as friendship.
2) I told him that I have always had this gray area, which he was really surprised by. He asked why I never said anything, and I told him that I didn't know what to do about it. I was pretty sure that he has always had that gray area, so I felt like it was on me to tap into that, and if I were ever to bring up my gray area, we would certainly get into a conversation about a relationship between the two of us. However, I was really torn on whether or not I want a relationship with him, so I felt that any conversations we have on the topic would be a dead-end with no resolution. So I never brought it up.
3) He asked where I thought we are right now in terms of friendship/relationship. I likened our situation to being at the edge of a cliff. We'd gone down this gradual decline so far, and we've now come to a cliff that we can jump off of together, or back away from. I want to jump, but I'm afraid of what's down below. He asked me if I thought fear alone was reason enough not to jump, and that he would never want to always wonder, "What if? What could have been?" So he wants to jump as long as I would jump with him. I told him that I didn't know.
4) I said that there are logistical roadblocks to our being together, and it's hard for me to see a clear defined future, meaning that he's Irish, and he'd want to go back to Ireland after school is over, and I would want to stay here in the US. He said that he actually has thought of that, and he thinks he would want to stay in the US.
5) He asked if my only hesitation for starting a relationship was this fear of screwing up what we have right now. I said that I didn't know. What I left unsaid was that I'm not really physically attracted to him. This I thought some more about (and have been thinking about), and I think I could get over it. I feel that I'm starting to get over his chubbiness, but I wonder if that's me trying to convince myself that I can date him because of all the other good things about him.
6) I told him that I was really torn, especially given the situation with RC. I told Irish that I really like RC, and had pretty much settled on wanting to see where things would go with that and wanting to move it toward the direction of a serious committed relationship. I told Irish that I don't know how to turn my back on RC, but at the same time, I wanted to give Irish and me a chance because it is obvious that we have a lot we connect over, and it is definitely obvious that there is something between us.
So in the end, I didn't know how to resolve this situation. I feel like there aren't really good reason for me and Irish not to date, besides the fact that I find him chubby. At the same time, I want to give a chance for RC and me. I really see a lot of potential there, and I hate to throw it all away. I even told Irish that I wouldn't know what to say to RC if I were to break things off. My heart wouldn't be set on it; everything I would tell him would be a lie because I do really like him, and I don't want to break things off. If ever I did, it would be because I would want to jump off the cliff with Irish, and I don't know if that's the right decision for me right now.
I feel that if RC were not in the picture, I would have plunged with Irish last night to give the two of us a try. I do think the chubbiness thing is becoming less and less of an issue (and his guitar-playing and song-singing skills definitely help that :). However, with RC in the picture, I want to give RC and try, and go back to Irish if/when RC and I don't work out. That's me wanting to have my cake and to eat it, too.
Irish asked me a lot of questions last night about how compatible I thought we were, if I thought we'd have a good relationship together, what my ideal was. I told him pretty much the truth, including things like wanting a guy who knows the etiquette of dress up in a crisp button-up shirt and working/mingling a room for a wine & cheese (which I know he doesn't like), and the fact that in relationships, I'm really dependent and want to spend a lot of time with the person (completely different from my fleeting, independent nature I exhibit with friends), and that I'm very unreasonable when I get upset in a relationship and would sometimes pick fights for the sake of picking a fight (I know he hates fighting in relationships).
His responses were that he thinks I would push him to do some things he may not want to do (like wine and cheese parties), that being with me would force him to get over the chip on his shoulder about those things stemming from his experiences from childhood. He said that if we were together, we would both be independent in our own ways together. For example, he could see us arriving at a wine&cheese together, but then going in different directions as we independently "work the room". And as for the picking fights, he said that he's a "roll with the punches" kind of guy, and he would yield to me. I told him that his doing that would probably piss me off more because I would want him to fight back, and it would frustrate me that he's just taking the punches. He jokingly said, "well, in that case, I better start learning how to fight in a relationship, then!"
I do question how honest he is being with himself about that kind of stuff. Is he unrealistically bending over backwards to fit into the ideal mold that I have set up for my partner-for-life? Is he trying to convince me that we would work?
I really don't know what to do right now. My gut instinct is that I don't want to give up on RC. It would be a lot easier if RC were not in the picture, because I think I definitely would give Irish and me a chance. I don't want to have to always wonder, "what if?" with Irish and me.
If only these decisions are ever simple and clear cut.
I don't think I was purposefully keeping the news about me & RC away from Irish. The topic never came up in conversation, though I have to admit that I wasn't exactly trying to steer conversation in that direction either. So, after what RC said, I decided to tell Irish about RC and me. Last night, Irish and I were both hanging out a friend's apartment and having a pretty chill evening. When I drove him home afterwards, I told him that RC and I are dating.
That prompted Irish to say that he was glad I mentioned something because it would allow him a chance to say something, too. Here, my heart fluttered for a second because I thought he was going to say that he'd been dating someone, too, which I knew would make me feel sad. Instead, he said that he felt like some of the stuff he's said or has done since coming back from Ireland may have given me the false impression that he was doing them out of something more than friendship, he wanted to make sure I knew that his motivations were purely those of just-a-friend.
My heart still sank upon hearing this. I'd always felt that Irish would always be there for me, and here he was telling me essentially that he's over me and wants to purely be "just friends", closing the door on anything more.
Then he asked me if I ever misinterpretted his actions and thought that they stemmed from somewhere beyond plain friendship. I had to admit to him that I did. I mean, he brought me back gorgeous silver Celtic earrings from Ireland, for crying out loud. That's not something a "just friends" male friend would give a girl; it's more along the lines of what a brother or a boyfriend would give. I'm not sure how the conversation proceeded from there, but we ended up talking until 5:30am about us. Here is the stuff I remember:
1) He really likes me, and there has always been a gray area between friendship and wanting something more in his mind. He thought that when we decided to just be friends back in March, that this conversation would never come up again because he always thought I only wanted friendship, which was why his actions from there on out were focused completely on friendship and he wanted to make sure that I would see them only as friendship.
2) I told him that I have always had this gray area, which he was really surprised by. He asked why I never said anything, and I told him that I didn't know what to do about it. I was pretty sure that he has always had that gray area, so I felt like it was on me to tap into that, and if I were ever to bring up my gray area, we would certainly get into a conversation about a relationship between the two of us. However, I was really torn on whether or not I want a relationship with him, so I felt that any conversations we have on the topic would be a dead-end with no resolution. So I never brought it up.
3) He asked where I thought we are right now in terms of friendship/relationship. I likened our situation to being at the edge of a cliff. We'd gone down this gradual decline so far, and we've now come to a cliff that we can jump off of together, or back away from. I want to jump, but I'm afraid of what's down below. He asked me if I thought fear alone was reason enough not to jump, and that he would never want to always wonder, "What if? What could have been?" So he wants to jump as long as I would jump with him. I told him that I didn't know.
4) I said that there are logistical roadblocks to our being together, and it's hard for me to see a clear defined future, meaning that he's Irish, and he'd want to go back to Ireland after school is over, and I would want to stay here in the US. He said that he actually has thought of that, and he thinks he would want to stay in the US.
5) He asked if my only hesitation for starting a relationship was this fear of screwing up what we have right now. I said that I didn't know. What I left unsaid was that I'm not really physically attracted to him. This I thought some more about (and have been thinking about), and I think I could get over it. I feel that I'm starting to get over his chubbiness, but I wonder if that's me trying to convince myself that I can date him because of all the other good things about him.
6) I told him that I was really torn, especially given the situation with RC. I told Irish that I really like RC, and had pretty much settled on wanting to see where things would go with that and wanting to move it toward the direction of a serious committed relationship. I told Irish that I don't know how to turn my back on RC, but at the same time, I wanted to give Irish and me a chance because it is obvious that we have a lot we connect over, and it is definitely obvious that there is something between us.
So in the end, I didn't know how to resolve this situation. I feel like there aren't really good reason for me and Irish not to date, besides the fact that I find him chubby. At the same time, I want to give a chance for RC and me. I really see a lot of potential there, and I hate to throw it all away. I even told Irish that I wouldn't know what to say to RC if I were to break things off. My heart wouldn't be set on it; everything I would tell him would be a lie because I do really like him, and I don't want to break things off. If ever I did, it would be because I would want to jump off the cliff with Irish, and I don't know if that's the right decision for me right now.
I feel that if RC were not in the picture, I would have plunged with Irish last night to give the two of us a try. I do think the chubbiness thing is becoming less and less of an issue (and his guitar-playing and song-singing skills definitely help that :). However, with RC in the picture, I want to give RC and try, and go back to Irish if/when RC and I don't work out. That's me wanting to have my cake and to eat it, too.
Irish asked me a lot of questions last night about how compatible I thought we were, if I thought we'd have a good relationship together, what my ideal was. I told him pretty much the truth, including things like wanting a guy who knows the etiquette of dress up in a crisp button-up shirt and working/mingling a room for a wine & cheese (which I know he doesn't like), and the fact that in relationships, I'm really dependent and want to spend a lot of time with the person (completely different from my fleeting, independent nature I exhibit with friends), and that I'm very unreasonable when I get upset in a relationship and would sometimes pick fights for the sake of picking a fight (I know he hates fighting in relationships).
His responses were that he thinks I would push him to do some things he may not want to do (like wine and cheese parties), that being with me would force him to get over the chip on his shoulder about those things stemming from his experiences from childhood. He said that if we were together, we would both be independent in our own ways together. For example, he could see us arriving at a wine&cheese together, but then going in different directions as we independently "work the room". And as for the picking fights, he said that he's a "roll with the punches" kind of guy, and he would yield to me. I told him that his doing that would probably piss me off more because I would want him to fight back, and it would frustrate me that he's just taking the punches. He jokingly said, "well, in that case, I better start learning how to fight in a relationship, then!"
I do question how honest he is being with himself about that kind of stuff. Is he unrealistically bending over backwards to fit into the ideal mold that I have set up for my partner-for-life? Is he trying to convince me that we would work?
I really don't know what to do right now. My gut instinct is that I don't want to give up on RC. It would be a lot easier if RC were not in the picture, because I think I definitely would give Irish and me a chance. I don't want to have to always wonder, "what if?" with Irish and me.
If only these decisions are ever simple and clear cut.
Wednesday, September 20, 2006
lunch date!
RC's going away on a conference this weekend, leaving tomorrow afternoon and returning Sunday. The timing's actually perfect, because I have a friend (let's call her Legare) visiting from out of town this weekend. So now, I can just focus on her, and not feel bad to not have time for RC, or to force some kind of "let's all hang out together." I'm sure the latter would be fun, but I kinda want alone catch-up time with Legare. She's coming with me to Poker's BBQ on Saturday, btw, and he's challenged us to croquet (or did we challenge him? I don't remember the order).
Monday, RC called me to say hi. We didn't talk very long. I didn't hear from him yesterday, and I actually wondered, "aww, RC didn't call me today." Then I realized, "Why can't I call him? In fact, I should probably call him since he's the one who usually makes the calls to me." Especially after our conversations from last weekend, I didn't want him to think that I don't want to take the initiative to pick up the phone and dial because I was no longer interested.
So this afternoon I called him and left a message, "Calling to say hi. I know you're leaving tomorrow [Thursday] for the conference, and I was hoping to just catch you before you left." He called back (he had a doctor's appointment when I called), and we chatted nicely for some 15 minutes, and he said he'd get in touch once he gets back from his trip.
About an hour ago, he called me again. I was with one of my students, so I let it go to voice mail. When I called him back, he said he realized that he wouldn't see me for a few days (well, duh sherlock, you're going out of town on a conference :), so he wanted to see if I would be free for lunch tomorrow. I actually have a meeting (with lunch provided) scheduled for tomorrow, but I still scheduled a lunch with RC after the meeting, so we now have a lunch date tomorrow at 1pm.
I just thought it was really sweet that he would call and ask to get lunch with me before he left town. It made me feel special. The way he said it too was great. He has this very patient mellow voice, and when he said "I realized I wouldn't be able to see you for a few days, so I thought maybe we could get lunch tomorrow so I can see you before I leave" ...
*sigh* I melted :)
Monday, RC called me to say hi. We didn't talk very long. I didn't hear from him yesterday, and I actually wondered, "aww, RC didn't call me today." Then I realized, "Why can't I call him? In fact, I should probably call him since he's the one who usually makes the calls to me." Especially after our conversations from last weekend, I didn't want him to think that I don't want to take the initiative to pick up the phone and dial because I was no longer interested.
So this afternoon I called him and left a message, "Calling to say hi. I know you're leaving tomorrow [Thursday] for the conference, and I was hoping to just catch you before you left." He called back (he had a doctor's appointment when I called), and we chatted nicely for some 15 minutes, and he said he'd get in touch once he gets back from his trip.
About an hour ago, he called me again. I was with one of my students, so I let it go to voice mail. When I called him back, he said he realized that he wouldn't see me for a few days (well, duh sherlock, you're going out of town on a conference :), so he wanted to see if I would be free for lunch tomorrow. I actually have a meeting (with lunch provided) scheduled for tomorrow, but I still scheduled a lunch with RC after the meeting, so we now have a lunch date tomorrow at 1pm.
I just thought it was really sweet that he would call and ask to get lunch with me before he left town. It made me feel special. The way he said it too was great. He has this very patient mellow voice, and when he said "I realized I wouldn't be able to see you for a few days, so I thought maybe we could get lunch tomorrow so I can see you before I leave" ...
*sigh* I melted :)
Tuesday, September 19, 2006
frustration!
Because I have serious writer's block, and I get easily distracted these days while (not) writing my thesis proposal, I consult Facebook.com a lot. There's a guy on facebook (a friend of mine) who keeps poking me. Every time he does, I poke him back. So about once a day, we poke each other.
So my question is ... what is the meaning of all of this? Is this some strange online ritual that replaces flirting?
Let's back up a minute here and introduce the guy. Let's call him Poker. Poker befriended me on facebook a couple of months ago. We first met about this time last year, but I'd forgotten his name, and we never saw each other again until we went to a mutual friend's birthday party a couple of months ago. I remembered having seen his facebook profile before (when I get bored, I just surf around), but I'm always skittish about adding people as friends, so I never added him. After I got home from our mutual friend's birthday party, I had a facebook friend invite from him. It seems a bit TOO coincidental that he would meet me, go home, happen to login to facebook, happen to browse through some people, HAPPEN to come across my profile, and happen to notice, "oh, hey, that's the girl I met earlier tonight."
It definitely made me wonder if he had seen/read my profile already (like I had of his), but he was in the same predicament about whether or not to befriend me, and as soon as we actually met and talked for a while in person, he thought, "okay, time to add her as a friend because it wouldn't be creepy-stalkerish now that I've actually talked to her."
A week after we add each other as friends, he pokes me on facebook. For those unfamiliar with facebook, it has this feature where you can "poke" people. It's a pretty worthless function. Basically, you click a button, and the next time they log in, they see a message that says "Jane Doe has poked you", and they're given the option to poke you back.
I see that he poked me, and my immediate reaction was, "huh, interesting." I don't use the poke option very much (except a few times with the ex when we were still together), so I was new at this, so I poked him back.
He poked me back.
I wasn't sure what I was supposed to do at this point. Keep poking him? I didn't get it. So I left him a casual joking message saying "geez, don't be such a poker". He messages me: "I should have warned you before we became facebook friends - I love the poking". Hmm ... okay. Meanwhile, he's poked me again. Okay ... so I poke him back. Very very interesting.
Ah, also worth noting about Poker: the night of our mutual friend's birthday party, I got a sense that he may have been flirting with me. The day after the bday party (we had both added each other as facebook friends by this point), he messaged me on facebook saying that he was getting some people together to go out, and would I be interested? I honestly had plans that night, so I told him so, but I told him to keep me in the loop next time he goes out.
He leaves town to go home for a while, and returned to boston about three weeks ago. The poking was constant and consistent (about every other day I would get a poke from him, for which I would poke him back). After he got back to boston, he messaged me again on facebook, "Let's get some people together and go out." I told him that my friends and I had made some serious plans for Thurs, Fri, Sat, and Sun of the upcoming weekend, and that he was certainly more than welcome to join us for any/all of it, as well as friends he'd like to bring along.
So he baits on Thursday night, and he comes out with my friends and I to a club. Alone. He didn't bring any friends, so it's basically him and a bunch of my friends whom he doesn't know. I found that a bit suspicious (wondering if he was just wanting to spend time with me, and using the whole "let's get some people together to go out" as a discreet way to spend some time together). Hmm ... okay .... what's going on here?
Anyway, he's cute, he's tall, he's a good dancer ... and we have a good time out (though he had to leave early, and I ended up going home with my friend with benefits). I didn't really hear from him directly again, but the poking on facebook kept on going strong.
So what gives? If he's really interested, why doesn't he do something besides poking me on facebook? If he's not interested, why keep poking me on facebook?
Anyways, I'm writing this because I got really frustrated just now. I signed into facebook, and lo and behold, there was a poke from Mr. Poker. What the heck does he want? Innocent flirting? I'm a big proponent of innocent flirting, but 1) does facebook poking even count as flirting? and 2) flirting or no flirting aside, constantly poking back and forth for 2 months is no fun. (but damn it, I'm not gonna be the one to break the chain).
**ADD at 8pm**: speak of the devil ... Poker & his roommates are having a BBQ this weekend, and he sent me an invite. The email had ~10 people on it, so at first I felt kinda special (wow, I got invited to a BBQ as one of 10 people). Then I thought about it, and I realized there's no way they're only inviting 10 people. I'm sure his roommates are inviting folks too. Anyway, I think I'll go this Saturday and figure out just what gives with Poker.
So my question is ... what is the meaning of all of this? Is this some strange online ritual that replaces flirting?
Let's back up a minute here and introduce the guy. Let's call him Poker. Poker befriended me on facebook a couple of months ago. We first met about this time last year, but I'd forgotten his name, and we never saw each other again until we went to a mutual friend's birthday party a couple of months ago. I remembered having seen his facebook profile before (when I get bored, I just surf around), but I'm always skittish about adding people as friends, so I never added him. After I got home from our mutual friend's birthday party, I had a facebook friend invite from him. It seems a bit TOO coincidental that he would meet me, go home, happen to login to facebook, happen to browse through some people, HAPPEN to come across my profile, and happen to notice, "oh, hey, that's the girl I met earlier tonight."
It definitely made me wonder if he had seen/read my profile already (like I had of his), but he was in the same predicament about whether or not to befriend me, and as soon as we actually met and talked for a while in person, he thought, "okay, time to add her as a friend because it wouldn't be creepy-stalkerish now that I've actually talked to her."
A week after we add each other as friends, he pokes me on facebook. For those unfamiliar with facebook, it has this feature where you can "poke" people. It's a pretty worthless function. Basically, you click a button, and the next time they log in, they see a message that says "Jane Doe has poked you", and they're given the option to poke you back.
I see that he poked me, and my immediate reaction was, "huh, interesting." I don't use the poke option very much (except a few times with the ex when we were still together), so I was new at this, so I poked him back.
He poked me back.
I wasn't sure what I was supposed to do at this point. Keep poking him? I didn't get it. So I left him a casual joking message saying "geez, don't be such a poker". He messages me: "I should have warned you before we became facebook friends - I love the poking". Hmm ... okay. Meanwhile, he's poked me again. Okay ... so I poke him back. Very very interesting.
Ah, also worth noting about Poker: the night of our mutual friend's birthday party, I got a sense that he may have been flirting with me. The day after the bday party (we had both added each other as facebook friends by this point), he messaged me on facebook saying that he was getting some people together to go out, and would I be interested? I honestly had plans that night, so I told him so, but I told him to keep me in the loop next time he goes out.
He leaves town to go home for a while, and returned to boston about three weeks ago. The poking was constant and consistent (about every other day I would get a poke from him, for which I would poke him back). After he got back to boston, he messaged me again on facebook, "Let's get some people together and go out." I told him that my friends and I had made some serious plans for Thurs, Fri, Sat, and Sun of the upcoming weekend, and that he was certainly more than welcome to join us for any/all of it, as well as friends he'd like to bring along.
So he baits on Thursday night, and he comes out with my friends and I to a club. Alone. He didn't bring any friends, so it's basically him and a bunch of my friends whom he doesn't know. I found that a bit suspicious (wondering if he was just wanting to spend time with me, and using the whole "let's get some people together to go out" as a discreet way to spend some time together). Hmm ... okay .... what's going on here?
Anyway, he's cute, he's tall, he's a good dancer ... and we have a good time out (though he had to leave early, and I ended up going home with my friend with benefits). I didn't really hear from him directly again, but the poking on facebook kept on going strong.
So what gives? If he's really interested, why doesn't he do something besides poking me on facebook? If he's not interested, why keep poking me on facebook?
Anyways, I'm writing this because I got really frustrated just now. I signed into facebook, and lo and behold, there was a poke from Mr. Poker. What the heck does he want? Innocent flirting? I'm a big proponent of innocent flirting, but 1) does facebook poking even count as flirting? and 2) flirting or no flirting aside, constantly poking back and forth for 2 months is no fun. (but damn it, I'm not gonna be the one to break the chain).
**ADD at 8pm**: speak of the devil ... Poker & his roommates are having a BBQ this weekend, and he sent me an invite. The email had ~10 people on it, so at first I felt kinda special (wow, I got invited to a BBQ as one of 10 people). Then I thought about it, and I realized there's no way they're only inviting 10 people. I'm sure his roommates are inviting folks too. Anyway, I think I'll go this Saturday and figure out just what gives with Poker.
Sunday, September 17, 2006
a few steps forward
RC and I had a wonderful time together this past weekend, and I think that I may actually be somewhat falling for him. As I sit here working on my thesis proposal, all I can think about is him and how I wish I were spending time with him instead. I haven't felt like that in a long time. With Mr. C, all I could think about was how I was content having dinner with him once a week and how I never wanted to spend more time with him. I thought I changed to a low-maintenance girl to have around; one of those who doesn't mind only seeing her guy once a week. But no, it was just the wrong guy.
We got pretty personal this weekend, having multiple conversations about very private topics. Some of the stuff he told me were very unexpected and puts a whole different spin on things. He had told me before that he was in a very bad car accident about five years ago, and had some spinal cord damage as a result of that. That accident left some very permanent handicaps that aren't obvious/visible to the casual bystander, but that which affects his every day life, and subsequently those close to him in nlife.
After he told me, he asked if the information changes how I feel. I wasn't sure what to say. To say that it makes no difference would be a naive lie, but just how much difference it makes, I don't even know myself. I feel like it's stuff that is, while non-trivial, on the whole something I could live with. But how much of that is my trying to convince myself that I can live with it because I really dig him?
I feel like RC and I moved quite a few steps forward toward a committed relationship with each other. Just Friday, the idea of a boyfriend was appalling to me. After this weekend, I am not so opposed to the idea.
We got pretty personal this weekend, having multiple conversations about very private topics. Some of the stuff he told me were very unexpected and puts a whole different spin on things. He had told me before that he was in a very bad car accident about five years ago, and had some spinal cord damage as a result of that. That accident left some very permanent handicaps that aren't obvious/visible to the casual bystander, but that which affects his every day life, and subsequently those close to him in nlife.
After he told me, he asked if the information changes how I feel. I wasn't sure what to say. To say that it makes no difference would be a naive lie, but just how much difference it makes, I don't even know myself. I feel like it's stuff that is, while non-trivial, on the whole something I could live with. But how much of that is my trying to convince myself that I can live with it because I really dig him?
I feel like RC and I moved quite a few steps forward toward a committed relationship with each other. Just Friday, the idea of a boyfriend was appalling to me. After this weekend, I am not so opposed to the idea.
Saturday, September 16, 2006
friends vs. dating
I had lunch with M again yesterday, and she told me about her current dilemma ... she's dating this guy; if she were to have a relationship, it would be with him, but she doesn't know if she wants a relationship. Furthermore, he wants to hang out with her and her friends (which would include the whole gang of Y, J, and several others), but things would be very awkward and weird with Y.
It's interesting that we both feel so alienated with our own friend circle in terms of wanting to keep our dating lives separate. I think about why I have never introduced the guys I've dated to the friend circle. I feel like I ultimately ask myself, "is it worth it?" I don't try to hide dates from my friend group, but I also don't go running around saying, "Oh, I can't come to this party Friday night because I have a date."
I think I personally enjoy the attention afforded to me by the guys of our group; it's certainly an ego-booster. I think there is always some sexual tension between me and the guys (and also between M and the guys), and that's why both of us feel like we want to keep our dating lives separate from the friends. If we introduce a date into the circle, it would disrupt the balance/status quo, and neither one of us really knows what would happen.
Back in January, when my friend circle was quite a bits different, I remember going on a first date with a guy for dinner. After dinner, neither one of us really wanted to part ways, so I asked if he would like to come with me to a bar where a bunch of my friends were that night. Everybody ended up having loads of fun.
Something like that would never happen with my current friend group, mainly because of this question I keep asking myself, "Is is worth it?" Is it worth it to introduce the guy to the group, hurt Y in the process (we've never talked about dating other people), throw my dynamic with the group into wack, when the guy may only be sticking around for another date or two?
Perhaps I can use wanting to introduce the guy to the friends as a ruler for how I feel about the guy. If I consistently want to keep things very separate, even after multiple dates, then it probably means I am not that into him. If, however, I want to bring him into the circle, then it's a sign that I'm ready to take things to the next level.
It's interesting that we both feel so alienated with our own friend circle in terms of wanting to keep our dating lives separate. I think about why I have never introduced the guys I've dated to the friend circle. I feel like I ultimately ask myself, "is it worth it?" I don't try to hide dates from my friend group, but I also don't go running around saying, "Oh, I can't come to this party Friday night because I have a date."
I think I personally enjoy the attention afforded to me by the guys of our group; it's certainly an ego-booster. I think there is always some sexual tension between me and the guys (and also between M and the guys), and that's why both of us feel like we want to keep our dating lives separate from the friends. If we introduce a date into the circle, it would disrupt the balance/status quo, and neither one of us really knows what would happen.
Back in January, when my friend circle was quite a bits different, I remember going on a first date with a guy for dinner. After dinner, neither one of us really wanted to part ways, so I asked if he would like to come with me to a bar where a bunch of my friends were that night. Everybody ended up having loads of fun.
Something like that would never happen with my current friend group, mainly because of this question I keep asking myself, "Is is worth it?" Is it worth it to introduce the guy to the group, hurt Y in the process (we've never talked about dating other people), throw my dynamic with the group into wack, when the guy may only be sticking around for another date or two?
Perhaps I can use wanting to introduce the guy to the friends as a ruler for how I feel about the guy. If I consistently want to keep things very separate, even after multiple dates, then it probably means I am not that into him. If, however, I want to bring him into the circle, then it's a sign that I'm ready to take things to the next level.
Friday, September 15, 2006
balance
RC called me today asking what I was doing tomorrow (Friday) night. Of course, I said that I had no plans, but you know what? I wasn't even too keen on saying that just because of all the conversations the other night. I thought about things, and I asked myself "How would i feel calling RC my boyfriend?" ... and honestly, I kinda grimaced at the thought. Does that mean that I'm not ready for RC? Or does that mean that I'm not ready for a boyfriend?
The balance comes into play when I think about what I want to do. Right now, my first and foremost goal is to do my thesis proposal for my graduate degree, which is set for Oct 16. Except, I still act like my life is about partying and having a good time, even though my grad student status (as unlucrative as it is) supports my habits), and the more I party, the less I grad-school, and the more likely I will lose my source of income that feeds my habit.
My second goal/desire is just to not think too much and just to enjoy myself. I thought about where I was a year ago ... I wanted to get married; I wanted to settle down; I wanted a ring on my finger; I was so in love with the ex (let's call him Key) that I lost sight of myself. I think that was great, because when we are truly in love with someone, and when we are ready to make that commitment, we think in terms of "we" and not in terms of "me". A year ago, I thought in terms of "we" because I saw "we" as being forever. Gosh, how short that forever lasted. I was burned so badly by Key.
So now, I fly solo. I date, but I have become the person who is perpetually afraid of commitment; I have come to exemplify the kind of behavior that I can't stand nor understand in guys. More than anything else, I have come to really want my own space (REALLY highlighted by the incident with Mr. C).
Take for example: this weekend. I got invited to three parties for tomorrow (Friday) night, and three for Saturday (five originally, but two got cancelled). I want to spend time with my friends; I want the free time that I have to be spent the way that I want it to be spent, not the way I feel like I should have to spend it.
I am one to try to bring together groups of people. When I get a party invite, I'm the kind of person who would mention it to every friend I come across who asks me what I'm doing on X night: "well, actually, I know of this party if you're interested." So what ends up happening is that three separate groups of friends end up saying "yeah, that party sounds great; let's go" and I end up shuffling my social obligations to all three groups at the same event, who don't usually mingle with each other.
I find it stressful to go from one group of friend to another. I want to just do my own thing, which I define as picking my favorite outing activity, doing it with the people whom I enjoy being around, and not feeling any obligations to have done anything else, and not feeling any guilt that I blew everybody else off. This includes RC.
So I agreed to do something with RC tomorrow night, when really, I want to go out with my friends. But it would be rude of me to go back on that now and say to RC, "well, actually, I want to go out with my friends." Inviting him along isn't really an option, because he made it pretty clear that 1) he doesn't drink, and 2) he doesn't really go out much, out of preference.
Where's the balance between friends and dates? Will it become painfully obvious when the right guy comes along such that I no longer care about balance, and all I want to do is to spend every waking moment with him?
The balance comes into play when I think about what I want to do. Right now, my first and foremost goal is to do my thesis proposal for my graduate degree, which is set for Oct 16. Except, I still act like my life is about partying and having a good time, even though my grad student status (as unlucrative as it is) supports my habits), and the more I party, the less I grad-school, and the more likely I will lose my source of income that feeds my habit.
My second goal/desire is just to not think too much and just to enjoy myself. I thought about where I was a year ago ... I wanted to get married; I wanted to settle down; I wanted a ring on my finger; I was so in love with the ex (let's call him Key) that I lost sight of myself. I think that was great, because when we are truly in love with someone, and when we are ready to make that commitment, we think in terms of "we" and not in terms of "me". A year ago, I thought in terms of "we" because I saw "we" as being forever. Gosh, how short that forever lasted. I was burned so badly by Key.
So now, I fly solo. I date, but I have become the person who is perpetually afraid of commitment; I have come to exemplify the kind of behavior that I can't stand nor understand in guys. More than anything else, I have come to really want my own space (REALLY highlighted by the incident with Mr. C).
Take for example: this weekend. I got invited to three parties for tomorrow (Friday) night, and three for Saturday (five originally, but two got cancelled). I want to spend time with my friends; I want the free time that I have to be spent the way that I want it to be spent, not the way I feel like I should have to spend it.
I am one to try to bring together groups of people. When I get a party invite, I'm the kind of person who would mention it to every friend I come across who asks me what I'm doing on X night: "well, actually, I know of this party if you're interested." So what ends up happening is that three separate groups of friends end up saying "yeah, that party sounds great; let's go" and I end up shuffling my social obligations to all three groups at the same event, who don't usually mingle with each other.
I find it stressful to go from one group of friend to another. I want to just do my own thing, which I define as picking my favorite outing activity, doing it with the people whom I enjoy being around, and not feeling any obligations to have done anything else, and not feeling any guilt that I blew everybody else off. This includes RC.
So I agreed to do something with RC tomorrow night, when really, I want to go out with my friends. But it would be rude of me to go back on that now and say to RC, "well, actually, I want to go out with my friends." Inviting him along isn't really an option, because he made it pretty clear that 1) he doesn't drink, and 2) he doesn't really go out much, out of preference.
Where's the balance between friends and dates? Will it become painfully obvious when the right guy comes along such that I no longer care about balance, and all I want to do is to spend every waking moment with him?
Wednesday, September 13, 2006
the current: RC
RC and I met at a wedding at the beginning of August. The wedding was in New Jersey, and before I got there, I actually thought to myself, "I wonder if I will meet anyone interesting, but oh well, they probably will be from Jersey anyways." As it turned out, I met RC, who is also a grad student like me in Boston. Despite both having known the mutual friend who was getting married for about two years, our paths never crossed before the wedding.
As we all got up to leave the wedding (there was a pretty obvious end to the celebrations with a mass exodus), RC asked me for my phone number. That wasn't the unusual thing. The unusual thing was that because everybody got up to leave at essentially at the same time, he asked for my number in front of everyone in our group while we were all standing in a circle. Very gutsy move, I thought, that also made it hard for me to not give him my # (how could I with so many people watching?).
That wasn't really an issue, because the thought didn't even cross my mind to not give him my number.
He waited two days to call (he called on a Tuesday; the wedding was the Sunday before), and we set up a brunch date for the following Saturday. This was around the time that I was getting really good vibes from Mr. C, so I actually almost called RC on Friday to say, "Sorry, I don't think we can do brunch." Instead, I decided to honor the date I had agreed to, to go, but to keep things casual and not follow up afterwards.
I'm really glad I went, because I started to really dig RC. He was the perfect stature I was looking for. He was the total gentlemen. We have a lot of the same interests. Both being grad students studying similar things was a toss-up as to being a pro or a con. On the one hand, we would both understand each others' lifestyles. On the other hand, I would sorta prefer to date someone who's not in the same field as I am (we both work on bio research projects).
That brunch led to a dinner&movies date a few days later, followed by a dinner&dancing date more than a week later (we were both really busy during the weekend in between), followed by his going out of town this past weekend, followed by another dinner date tonight.
Why this is different:
I have felt sincerely elated before each and every one of the dates (except the initial brunch), and that feeling has been sustained through all the dinner & movies & dancing. I never got bored; I was always interested. Most of all, I was always happy and giddy around him, which I really couldn't have claimed for Mr. C.
One small glitch:
At the dancing, we ran into another mutual friend El whom neither of us realized was a mutual friend. El, not realizing that RC and I were actually there together, asked RC, "where's your girlfriend?" I pretended to have been staring off into space and not paying attention enough to have heard anything, but I did notice RC shift awkwardly, glance quickly at me, shake his head discreetly while saying to El, "We're not ..." and trailing off, implying that the gf/bf status may be no longer.
Later that night, RC pulled me aside and asked if I had heard what El said. I lied, "no." RC then said that regardless, he wanted to clarify that El asked about his girlfriend because El wasn't aware that he and his girlfriend had broken up. He just didn't want me wondering what the heck was going on, and he wanted to make sure that I was still okay with things. I said that I, in general, don't care that much about history, as long as it doesn't impact the present.
Then I asked him how recent the breakup was, and he said that it happened midsummer. That's when I silently made a mental note to be on my toes a little bit. Midsummer would have been less than a couple of months ago. Also, the wedding was the beginning of August. Thus, do the math: when he and I met at the wedding, he had maybe been broken up for a couple of weeks, a month MAX. Hmm ... I wondered how ready he was for a new relationship and what exactly he was looking for in dating me? Rebound? Something working toward a committed relationship? Is he ready?
Tonight:
We met for dinner tonight, and we came back to my place afterwards (he asked what I was doing after dinner; I answered that nothing was planned, so he asked "May I come over?").
He comes over, and we sit on the couch and talk for a long time. I had noticed before that he is a very tactile person. Tonight was no exception; he played a lot with my hair, with my hands, pressing his fingers into my back almost as if he were giving me a massage while we both sat and talked on the couch. At one point, he just went in for the kiss. No warning; no hesitation; no go 90%, let her come 10 (see Hitch) ... It was just boom, kiss. It wasn't the best kiss in the world, but I have to say that I liked it :)
After a while, he definitely started testing out the waters to see how far he could get. I don't know; maybe I'm too conservative ... but I found that a bit sleazy. In general, I feel like the first kiss should be left at just that. It should be kept innocent and sweet, and not ridden with too much lust. When I think about it though, I don't really understand myself very much. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense that I would have no problems having a friend with benefits, but then be reluctant to let a guy I actually like to get to second base.
I wanted to tell RC that he could stay the night if he wanted because I wanted to snuggle, kiss, and sleep next next to him, but I didn't because I feared that there might be certain expectations that accompany staying the night that I definitely wasn't ready to meet. That or the awkwardness of saying, "I'm not okay with anything more than making out, but hey you can stay the night if you want to do nothing but sleep."
Conversations we had tonight:
1) He actually asked me where I thought the two of us were going.
This really surprised me because I still see things as being fairly early in the game, and I also see this conversation as one that women generally want to have and the men try to avoid for as long as possible. He kinda caught himself because as I thought about what I wanted to say, he asked "Or is that too early to talk about?" I replied, "No no, we can talk about it now" and told him "I see the two of us having a lot of potential" to which he readily nodded his head and agreed.
I then thought about it some more, and I said "I'd like to see us go somewhere."
His response to that wasn't negative, but it certainly wasn't positive. Instead of saying "Yeah, I agree. I'd like to see us go somewhere too", he said, "Let's see where things go." This confused me because it seemed almost like he didn't want "us" to go anywhere, but if that were the case, why would he have brought up this whole conversation to begin with by asking "Where do you think we're going?"
2) His ex-girlfriend
At the dancing the other night, after he told me about the ex-gf that El brought up, he said something to the effect of "Well, we can talk about this more when we're not out like this." So I took him up on it and asked him about her tonight. He said that things have been tricky because she doesn't want to fully accept the breakup and move on. He said that he felt he only liked her as a friend, so that's what he told her, which is how they broke up, but she is having a hard time dealing with that. I probably should have asked more (how long were you together? when actually did you break up? what does she do? etc etc), but I opted to keep my mouth shut.
3) Dating other people
Since we appeared to be talking about a lot of the hard topics anyways, I went ahead and asked him if he was seeing anybody else. He didn't answer right away (which to me meant that, yes, he is seeing other pepole) ... He paused, thought about it, and finally said "not seriously." I registered that to mean that he was dating other people in the same way he was dating me, but then he added, "You're the only one I've been dating seriously." That threw me for another loop because I no longer knew what "dating seriously" meant. I thought dating someone seriously meant dating him/her exclusively, but that's clearly not what his defintion was. I wanted to ask him "What do you mean by dating seriously?" But again, I opted to keep my mouth shut because that may have been too much.
So really, asking him if he was seeing anybody else resulted in my having even more questions.
He did ask me the same thing immediately afterwards. I told him that as of 2-3 weeks ago, I was still seeing some other people, but I had actually broken things off because I couldn't see them going anywhere so why bother? This prompted him to say that communication is really important.,"If you [hypothetical 'you'] are dating other people, that's fine, just let the other person know. If you no longer feel the same way, then tell the other person. As long as both people are honest and direct and actually communicating, then things should be okay." I told him that I agreed. Mentally, I was thinking to myself that I hope he follows through on his own advice and will do the same with me in keeping me in the loop when he dates other people and/or starts to feel differently about me.
4) Our compatibility
Earlier, I mentioned his hesitation and evading agreement when I said "I'd like to see us go somewhere." He followed that up with "Let's see where things go" and also "I feel like we don't really know each other yet. We learn more whenever we spend time together, so let's see where things go." He also mentioned that he knows I'm a busy girl, and that he doesn't want to distract me. My response to that was that we make time for those things that are important to us.
So after the conversation moved on to several different topics later, he brought up the point again that we don't really know each other very well, and because of that, he's not sure that we would mesh. I could tell there was something specific on his mind, and he finally named it: drinking and going out.
He said that he doesn't drink, mainly because of his religion (Baha'i), but he knows that I go out a lot. I wasn't sure what that meant so I asked him if he has problems with other people drinking, and he very quickly answered a definitive "no, no, not at all." Then I was confused, so I asked him if not having problems with other people drinking is the same standard he would also apply to someone he's dating. He didn't really answer the question ... instead he said that he doesn't want me to feel like I need to change my ways because he doesn't drink due to religious beliefs, or to feel like he is judging me when I do drink.
So I asked him if he was more concerned about my not being able to accept him not drinking than the fact that I do drink. He said yes, he was more worried how I would feel about him not drinking. So I said "well, I guess we'll have to just see."
I added that I actually don't drink that much, which didn't seem to really have much of an impact on his concern. Either he didn't believe me, or (more likely) it's not the drinking itself that he is concerned about incompatibility-wise, but rather the whole lifestyle of going out to clubs/bars/parties. I don't think he chooses to not do very much of that, and he is worried if we can have a relationship when our perspectives/lifestyles are so different.
So in the end, I think we had fruitful interesting conversations. I'm glad we laid a few things out in the open. I'd like to keep seeing him, but I guess anything else, we'll just have to wait and see.
As we all got up to leave the wedding (there was a pretty obvious end to the celebrations with a mass exodus), RC asked me for my phone number. That wasn't the unusual thing. The unusual thing was that because everybody got up to leave at essentially at the same time, he asked for my number in front of everyone in our group while we were all standing in a circle. Very gutsy move, I thought, that also made it hard for me to not give him my # (how could I with so many people watching?).
That wasn't really an issue, because the thought didn't even cross my mind to not give him my number.
He waited two days to call (he called on a Tuesday; the wedding was the Sunday before), and we set up a brunch date for the following Saturday. This was around the time that I was getting really good vibes from Mr. C, so I actually almost called RC on Friday to say, "Sorry, I don't think we can do brunch." Instead, I decided to honor the date I had agreed to, to go, but to keep things casual and not follow up afterwards.
I'm really glad I went, because I started to really dig RC. He was the perfect stature I was looking for. He was the total gentlemen. We have a lot of the same interests. Both being grad students studying similar things was a toss-up as to being a pro or a con. On the one hand, we would both understand each others' lifestyles. On the other hand, I would sorta prefer to date someone who's not in the same field as I am (we both work on bio research projects).
That brunch led to a dinner&movies date a few days later, followed by a dinner&dancing date more than a week later (we were both really busy during the weekend in between), followed by his going out of town this past weekend, followed by another dinner date tonight.
Why this is different:
I have felt sincerely elated before each and every one of the dates (except the initial brunch), and that feeling has been sustained through all the dinner & movies & dancing. I never got bored; I was always interested. Most of all, I was always happy and giddy around him, which I really couldn't have claimed for Mr. C.
One small glitch:
At the dancing, we ran into another mutual friend El whom neither of us realized was a mutual friend. El, not realizing that RC and I were actually there together, asked RC, "where's your girlfriend?" I pretended to have been staring off into space and not paying attention enough to have heard anything, but I did notice RC shift awkwardly, glance quickly at me, shake his head discreetly while saying to El, "We're not ..." and trailing off, implying that the gf/bf status may be no longer.
Later that night, RC pulled me aside and asked if I had heard what El said. I lied, "no." RC then said that regardless, he wanted to clarify that El asked about his girlfriend because El wasn't aware that he and his girlfriend had broken up. He just didn't want me wondering what the heck was going on, and he wanted to make sure that I was still okay with things. I said that I, in general, don't care that much about history, as long as it doesn't impact the present.
Then I asked him how recent the breakup was, and he said that it happened midsummer. That's when I silently made a mental note to be on my toes a little bit. Midsummer would have been less than a couple of months ago. Also, the wedding was the beginning of August. Thus, do the math: when he and I met at the wedding, he had maybe been broken up for a couple of weeks, a month MAX. Hmm ... I wondered how ready he was for a new relationship and what exactly he was looking for in dating me? Rebound? Something working toward a committed relationship? Is he ready?
Tonight:
We met for dinner tonight, and we came back to my place afterwards (he asked what I was doing after dinner; I answered that nothing was planned, so he asked "May I come over?").
He comes over, and we sit on the couch and talk for a long time. I had noticed before that he is a very tactile person. Tonight was no exception; he played a lot with my hair, with my hands, pressing his fingers into my back almost as if he were giving me a massage while we both sat and talked on the couch. At one point, he just went in for the kiss. No warning; no hesitation; no go 90%, let her come 10 (see Hitch) ... It was just boom, kiss. It wasn't the best kiss in the world, but I have to say that I liked it :)
After a while, he definitely started testing out the waters to see how far he could get. I don't know; maybe I'm too conservative ... but I found that a bit sleazy. In general, I feel like the first kiss should be left at just that. It should be kept innocent and sweet, and not ridden with too much lust. When I think about it though, I don't really understand myself very much. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense that I would have no problems having a friend with benefits, but then be reluctant to let a guy I actually like to get to second base.
I wanted to tell RC that he could stay the night if he wanted because I wanted to snuggle, kiss, and sleep next next to him, but I didn't because I feared that there might be certain expectations that accompany staying the night that I definitely wasn't ready to meet. That or the awkwardness of saying, "I'm not okay with anything more than making out, but hey you can stay the night if you want to do nothing but sleep."
Conversations we had tonight:
1) He actually asked me where I thought the two of us were going.
This really surprised me because I still see things as being fairly early in the game, and I also see this conversation as one that women generally want to have and the men try to avoid for as long as possible. He kinda caught himself because as I thought about what I wanted to say, he asked "Or is that too early to talk about?" I replied, "No no, we can talk about it now" and told him "I see the two of us having a lot of potential" to which he readily nodded his head and agreed.
I then thought about it some more, and I said "I'd like to see us go somewhere."
His response to that wasn't negative, but it certainly wasn't positive. Instead of saying "Yeah, I agree. I'd like to see us go somewhere too", he said, "Let's see where things go." This confused me because it seemed almost like he didn't want "us" to go anywhere, but if that were the case, why would he have brought up this whole conversation to begin with by asking "Where do you think we're going?"
2) His ex-girlfriend
At the dancing the other night, after he told me about the ex-gf that El brought up, he said something to the effect of "Well, we can talk about this more when we're not out like this." So I took him up on it and asked him about her tonight. He said that things have been tricky because she doesn't want to fully accept the breakup and move on. He said that he felt he only liked her as a friend, so that's what he told her, which is how they broke up, but she is having a hard time dealing with that. I probably should have asked more (how long were you together? when actually did you break up? what does she do? etc etc), but I opted to keep my mouth shut.
3) Dating other people
Since we appeared to be talking about a lot of the hard topics anyways, I went ahead and asked him if he was seeing anybody else. He didn't answer right away (which to me meant that, yes, he is seeing other pepole) ... He paused, thought about it, and finally said "not seriously." I registered that to mean that he was dating other people in the same way he was dating me, but then he added, "You're the only one I've been dating seriously." That threw me for another loop because I no longer knew what "dating seriously" meant. I thought dating someone seriously meant dating him/her exclusively, but that's clearly not what his defintion was. I wanted to ask him "What do you mean by dating seriously?" But again, I opted to keep my mouth shut because that may have been too much.
So really, asking him if he was seeing anybody else resulted in my having even more questions.
He did ask me the same thing immediately afterwards. I told him that as of 2-3 weeks ago, I was still seeing some other people, but I had actually broken things off because I couldn't see them going anywhere so why bother? This prompted him to say that communication is really important.,"If you [hypothetical 'you'] are dating other people, that's fine, just let the other person know. If you no longer feel the same way, then tell the other person. As long as both people are honest and direct and actually communicating, then things should be okay." I told him that I agreed. Mentally, I was thinking to myself that I hope he follows through on his own advice and will do the same with me in keeping me in the loop when he dates other people and/or starts to feel differently about me.
4) Our compatibility
Earlier, I mentioned his hesitation and evading agreement when I said "I'd like to see us go somewhere." He followed that up with "Let's see where things go" and also "I feel like we don't really know each other yet. We learn more whenever we spend time together, so let's see where things go." He also mentioned that he knows I'm a busy girl, and that he doesn't want to distract me. My response to that was that we make time for those things that are important to us.
So after the conversation moved on to several different topics later, he brought up the point again that we don't really know each other very well, and because of that, he's not sure that we would mesh. I could tell there was something specific on his mind, and he finally named it: drinking and going out.
He said that he doesn't drink, mainly because of his religion (Baha'i), but he knows that I go out a lot. I wasn't sure what that meant so I asked him if he has problems with other people drinking, and he very quickly answered a definitive "no, no, not at all." Then I was confused, so I asked him if not having problems with other people drinking is the same standard he would also apply to someone he's dating. He didn't really answer the question ... instead he said that he doesn't want me to feel like I need to change my ways because he doesn't drink due to religious beliefs, or to feel like he is judging me when I do drink.
So I asked him if he was more concerned about my not being able to accept him not drinking than the fact that I do drink. He said yes, he was more worried how I would feel about him not drinking. So I said "well, I guess we'll have to just see."
I added that I actually don't drink that much, which didn't seem to really have much of an impact on his concern. Either he didn't believe me, or (more likely) it's not the drinking itself that he is concerned about incompatibility-wise, but rather the whole lifestyle of going out to clubs/bars/parties. I don't think he chooses to not do very much of that, and he is worried if we can have a relationship when our perspectives/lifestyles are so different.
So in the end, I think we had fruitful interesting conversations. I'm glad we laid a few things out in the open. I'd like to keep seeing him, but I guess anything else, we'll just have to wait and see.
Monday, September 11, 2006
the consultant
I think this will be the last of the backdrop stories before most everything is up to date. This one is about Mr. Consultant. Mr. C and I met online, my first actual online dating experience. At first, I was really digging things and marveling at how great online dating was in bringing together people who are both single, looking for similar things in a relationship, and looking for each other.
Mr. C and I first started exchanging emails about a couple of months ago, which then moved on to Instant messenger. He lives in town, but gets shipped out to New York Monday through Friday because of his job (consulting). Since I was going out of town almost every single weekend from July 4 to mid-August, this made it a bit difficult for us to get together. We managed, though, a couple of times. First date was in a swanky steakhouse (we ran up a $250+ tab on dinner for two, yikes); second date he cooked for me at his place.
I should have gotten a clue then. I told my friend right after we set up the second date that I was a little bit nervous because I really don't know this guy and here I was going over to his house for dinner. She didn't think it was too out-of-the-ordinary. In fact she said that a lot of guys cook on second dates now because it's romantic, and it's a chance for them to impress the girl. That made sense, so I believed her and went along with it.
Thus here I was, dating this guy whom I'd met online. He was the first Asian guy whom I have found attractive enough with enough personality to date in a long time. He was assertive when he needed to be; he knew the right things to do, the things to say when, and he certainly wasn't shy despite being a total dork. So, I would say that things were going really well.
All except that he never gave me any space what-so-ever, and I should have known his asking me over to cook for me on a second date was him moving things along a little TOO fast.
As long as I was on IM, he would IM me. During the day when I'm at school, he would IM me things about his co-workers. At night when I'm at home listening to music and doing stuff on the internet, he would IM me to tell me about how hungry he was at 10pm at night. He IMed me so much so that I stopped signing onto IM. This didn't stop him.
I use gmail for all of my mail (every account I have forwards mail to gmail so that I can keep it all in one place). He also has gmail. When I stopped signing onto AIM, he started im-ing me via Google talk. So much so that I became afraid of checking my email because I was afraid that as soon as I logged on to check my email, he would google talk me.
Then came the text messages. At first it was kind of cute. I'd wake up in the morning and find a text from him: "Wake up sleepy head!" or I'd be staying late on-campus, and I'd get a text from him, "I'm going to dinner with friends." Or randomly when I'm out shopping, he'd text, "I'm so hungry!" The little things were cute initially; they made me feel like I was a part of his life. But only for a couple of days. The mundane texts never stopped coming. I would literally get a text at 11am from him saying "I'm so hungry!" followed by a text at 12pm saying "I'm going to lunch, yay!" followed by a text at 1pm: "oh man, I think i have food coma!"
I started dreading my phone vibrating me telling me that I have a new text. I would look at the text, see that it was from him, grit my teeth, roll my eyes, and just all-in-all be very frustrated. Then i would go talk to my one girlfriend whom knew about Mr. C to tell her just how ridiculous Mr. C's latest text was.
I didn't want to be a part of his life that much.
Plus, he ran up quite a bill on my cell phone. My bill still goes to my dad, who emailed me the other day to tell me that I had gone over my monthly text allowance by 136 texts. This is 136 over the 200 texts I get per month on my plan. So he ran up 336 texts on my phone in one month. That's some 10 texts a day. Yeah. And they are stuff I have no idea how to respond to. What do you say back to a guy who texts "I'm hungry!" almost every single day ???
So gradually, I no longer enjoyed the time that we spent together. It didn't help that every time I spent time with him, I felt like he wanted more of my time. I got the feeling that if I were to just give the okay, we would spend every minute of the weekend he's in town together. Not to mention I felt pressure from him to stay the night (to sleep, nothing else ... at least I wouldn't have allowed anything else). On multiple occasions, he asked, "you sure you can't just stay here tonight?" I thought it was kind of creepy and presumptuous, but I suppose it could have been sweet-/well-intentioned.
Essentially, things came down to my feeling very smothered and suffocated by him. I would go out with my friends and get some 10 texts from him in the course of the night. Part of that was my fault in advocating this initially. Because I was interested, and thought it cute that he would text me, I would text back, and we'd go back and forth several rounds, despite my being at a concert or in a club or at a bar. I did this for a couple of nights, and then everything became very old very quickly. But he never seemed to see any problems with it. Thus he continued to text me, IM me, gtalk me ... and I stopped responding, stopped signing onto IM, started putting up the red "busy" interdit symbol as my gstatus.
I think he kinda got the hint that something was going on when we made plans for dinner on a Saturday night, and I told him that "Sure, but I'm going out with some friends afterwards." I had actually considered asking if he wanted to come out with us, but I was really torn on the situation. I wasn't sure I wanted to introduce this guy into my friend circle yet, and given all the drama and hooking up in my friend circle, I think that I was more unready for my friend circle to know about him. In the end, I didn't invite him out, and I left him by himself around 10pm on a Saturday night so that I could go out with my friends without him.
Thinking back, that was pretty bad, but I also wasn't having a very good time with him because we were always talking about his work, or the new car he wanted to buy, or why this thing or that thing or the other thing in his life is such a "killer", his favorite adjective. 20 minutes after I left, he texted me "I got roped into seeing snakes on a plane at midnight. see what happens when you leave me alone?" I just rolled my eyes because I couldn't believe that he was texting me TWENTY minutes after I left.
Later that night, after my friends and I left the bar after last calls, we went to a burrito place that stays open late. Sometime around 2:30am, he texts me "it was terrible!" referring to the movie. Okay Mr. C, too much texting. Please just leave me alone.
Here is where the passive aggressiveness started. He would IM me, I would take 5+ minutes to respond to each exchange, and after a few lines I would tell him "sorry, I've got to run. I have a meeting."
Oh my god, I just remembered more. So part of the reason I started this blog was to get away from people who can google my name and come across the blog associated with my name on my own domain. I think he did something like this and thus found my other blog. I knew that he was reading my blog because I have a tracker on that blog, and he inadvertently, during one of our IM conversations, dropped a key piece of information about his mode of internet connection that allowed me to piece two-and-two together essentially and know exactly which IP belongs to him, so I always knew when he was reading my blog.
He did this for several weeks without mentioning a thing, which was fine. I understand the awkwardness of having googled someone and not wanting them to know lest they think you a creepy weird stalker but still being curious that you want to read what they have to say. However, Mr. C's problem was that he would use the information on my blog to make himself look better in conversations with me.
Here's an example. I was very stressed out at points this summer, particularly because I wasn't taking enough time to be by myself to just enjoy quiet life. So one of my blog entries was about needing time for myself. The next time I saw Mr. C, after I checked my blog tracker to see that he had indeed read the entry on needing time for myself, he asked how I was doing. I said that I was kinda stressed out, and Mr. C says, "Gosh Mini, I'm worried about you. You really need to take some time for yourself. Sometimes you just need to be by yourself."
Basically, he repeated back to me what I wrote on my blog. I could only think "How manipulative of you, Mr. C! You're hoping that I will think you so perceptive by telling me the exact things that I was thinking enough to put in my blog." If only he knew that I was aware of what he was up to the whole time ... wow, I can't even imagine having that conversation.
The way this all ended:
I think he picked up on the fact that I may be losing interest. Why else would I always run off with a "meeting" or "work" a few minutes after he IMs me? He sent me an email a couple of weeks ago:
Anyway, drop me a line when you get a chance. I just wanted to let you know what I was thinking (and was wondering what you were thinking too), and I figured e-mail would be a little less intrusive than an IM or a text. Hope you have a good day =)
- Mr. C
Just now, reading over the email, it actually sounds much sweeter than when I first read it. When I first read it, I was furious, mostly out of just sheer frustration that he would keep trying to invading my space. I was also really puzzled as to why an e-mail was less intrusive than IM/text. I really wanted to shoot an email back along the lines of "Mr. C, you're right. I really need my space right now. I'll talk to you later."
Anyways, so I didn't want to say anything over email, so I called him that night. My friend helped me come up with a script that I typed out in front of me so that I would remember what I wanted to say and how to say it. I small talked for a while with "how was work today?" etc. etc. To Mr. C's credit, he is actually pretty perceptive. After a few minutes of small talk, he point blankedly asked, "So are you calling because of my email today?" which made it easy for me to transition into my scripted schpeal.
I essentially told him that I really needed space right now because I am really busy, I have very little time, and that I just don't have time/energy for dating. He asked me "What do you mean by you need some space? Do you want to take things slow? Or do you want to just be friends?"
I hate the phrase "let's just be friends," so I was trying to avoid that, but he pretty much made me say it. So I did, and he was understanding, accepting, and said "sure, no problem. I am fine with whatever you decide to do. I'm also not completely closing the door here either. I know that you are pulled in too many directions right now and that you are really stressed out, so I totally understand you needing to take some time for yourself."
So that's how this fiasco with Mr. C ended. Except he still texts and IMs me. Not as much as before, but just the other night I got a text from him about business school (I was out at a club with friends around 11:30pm on a Thursday night). A couple of days ago, he sent me a link to his photo album of his new corporate apartment in manhattan. Tonight, he IMed me about more business school stuff.
And he still reads my blog.
But at least we're not dating anymore, so I feel no obligations to actually entertain his immense need for attention.
Mr. C and I first started exchanging emails about a couple of months ago, which then moved on to Instant messenger. He lives in town, but gets shipped out to New York Monday through Friday because of his job (consulting). Since I was going out of town almost every single weekend from July 4 to mid-August, this made it a bit difficult for us to get together. We managed, though, a couple of times. First date was in a swanky steakhouse (we ran up a $250+ tab on dinner for two, yikes); second date he cooked for me at his place.
I should have gotten a clue then. I told my friend right after we set up the second date that I was a little bit nervous because I really don't know this guy and here I was going over to his house for dinner. She didn't think it was too out-of-the-ordinary. In fact she said that a lot of guys cook on second dates now because it's romantic, and it's a chance for them to impress the girl. That made sense, so I believed her and went along with it.
Thus here I was, dating this guy whom I'd met online. He was the first Asian guy whom I have found attractive enough with enough personality to date in a long time. He was assertive when he needed to be; he knew the right things to do, the things to say when, and he certainly wasn't shy despite being a total dork. So, I would say that things were going really well.
All except that he never gave me any space what-so-ever, and I should have known his asking me over to cook for me on a second date was him moving things along a little TOO fast.
As long as I was on IM, he would IM me. During the day when I'm at school, he would IM me things about his co-workers. At night when I'm at home listening to music and doing stuff on the internet, he would IM me to tell me about how hungry he was at 10pm at night. He IMed me so much so that I stopped signing onto IM. This didn't stop him.
I use gmail for all of my mail (every account I have forwards mail to gmail so that I can keep it all in one place). He also has gmail. When I stopped signing onto AIM, he started im-ing me via Google talk. So much so that I became afraid of checking my email because I was afraid that as soon as I logged on to check my email, he would google talk me.
Then came the text messages. At first it was kind of cute. I'd wake up in the morning and find a text from him: "Wake up sleepy head!" or I'd be staying late on-campus, and I'd get a text from him, "I'm going to dinner with friends." Or randomly when I'm out shopping, he'd text, "I'm so hungry!" The little things were cute initially; they made me feel like I was a part of his life. But only for a couple of days. The mundane texts never stopped coming. I would literally get a text at 11am from him saying "I'm so hungry!" followed by a text at 12pm saying "I'm going to lunch, yay!" followed by a text at 1pm: "oh man, I think i have food coma!"
I started dreading my phone vibrating me telling me that I have a new text. I would look at the text, see that it was from him, grit my teeth, roll my eyes, and just all-in-all be very frustrated. Then i would go talk to my one girlfriend whom knew about Mr. C to tell her just how ridiculous Mr. C's latest text was.
I didn't want to be a part of his life that much.
Plus, he ran up quite a bill on my cell phone. My bill still goes to my dad, who emailed me the other day to tell me that I had gone over my monthly text allowance by 136 texts. This is 136 over the 200 texts I get per month on my plan. So he ran up 336 texts on my phone in one month. That's some 10 texts a day. Yeah. And they are stuff I have no idea how to respond to. What do you say back to a guy who texts "I'm hungry!" almost every single day ???
So gradually, I no longer enjoyed the time that we spent together. It didn't help that every time I spent time with him, I felt like he wanted more of my time. I got the feeling that if I were to just give the okay, we would spend every minute of the weekend he's in town together. Not to mention I felt pressure from him to stay the night (to sleep, nothing else ... at least I wouldn't have allowed anything else). On multiple occasions, he asked, "you sure you can't just stay here tonight?" I thought it was kind of creepy and presumptuous, but I suppose it could have been sweet-/well-intentioned.
Essentially, things came down to my feeling very smothered and suffocated by him. I would go out with my friends and get some 10 texts from him in the course of the night. Part of that was my fault in advocating this initially. Because I was interested, and thought it cute that he would text me, I would text back, and we'd go back and forth several rounds, despite my being at a concert or in a club or at a bar. I did this for a couple of nights, and then everything became very old very quickly. But he never seemed to see any problems with it. Thus he continued to text me, IM me, gtalk me ... and I stopped responding, stopped signing onto IM, started putting up the red "busy" interdit symbol as my gstatus.
I think he kinda got the hint that something was going on when we made plans for dinner on a Saturday night, and I told him that "Sure, but I'm going out with some friends afterwards." I had actually considered asking if he wanted to come out with us, but I was really torn on the situation. I wasn't sure I wanted to introduce this guy into my friend circle yet, and given all the drama and hooking up in my friend circle, I think that I was more unready for my friend circle to know about him. In the end, I didn't invite him out, and I left him by himself around 10pm on a Saturday night so that I could go out with my friends without him.
Thinking back, that was pretty bad, but I also wasn't having a very good time with him because we were always talking about his work, or the new car he wanted to buy, or why this thing or that thing or the other thing in his life is such a "killer", his favorite adjective. 20 minutes after I left, he texted me "I got roped into seeing snakes on a plane at midnight. see what happens when you leave me alone?" I just rolled my eyes because I couldn't believe that he was texting me TWENTY minutes after I left.
Later that night, after my friends and I left the bar after last calls, we went to a burrito place that stays open late. Sometime around 2:30am, he texts me "it was terrible!" referring to the movie. Okay Mr. C, too much texting. Please just leave me alone.
Here is where the passive aggressiveness started. He would IM me, I would take 5+ minutes to respond to each exchange, and after a few lines I would tell him "sorry, I've got to run. I have a meeting."
Oh my god, I just remembered more. So part of the reason I started this blog was to get away from people who can google my name and come across the blog associated with my name on my own domain. I think he did something like this and thus found my other blog. I knew that he was reading my blog because I have a tracker on that blog, and he inadvertently, during one of our IM conversations, dropped a key piece of information about his mode of internet connection that allowed me to piece two-and-two together essentially and know exactly which IP belongs to him, so I always knew when he was reading my blog.
He did this for several weeks without mentioning a thing, which was fine. I understand the awkwardness of having googled someone and not wanting them to know lest they think you a creepy weird stalker but still being curious that you want to read what they have to say. However, Mr. C's problem was that he would use the information on my blog to make himself look better in conversations with me.
Here's an example. I was very stressed out at points this summer, particularly because I wasn't taking enough time to be by myself to just enjoy quiet life. So one of my blog entries was about needing time for myself. The next time I saw Mr. C, after I checked my blog tracker to see that he had indeed read the entry on needing time for myself, he asked how I was doing. I said that I was kinda stressed out, and Mr. C says, "Gosh Mini, I'm worried about you. You really need to take some time for yourself. Sometimes you just need to be by yourself."
Basically, he repeated back to me what I wrote on my blog. I could only think "How manipulative of you, Mr. C! You're hoping that I will think you so perceptive by telling me the exact things that I was thinking enough to put in my blog." If only he knew that I was aware of what he was up to the whole time ... wow, I can't even imagine having that conversation.
The way this all ended:
I think he picked up on the fact that I may be losing interest. Why else would I always run off with a "meeting" or "work" a few minutes after he IMs me? He sent me an email a couple of weeks ago:
Hey Mini,
Is everything okay? I've felt a little guilty after our conversations lately, cause I feel like I'm stressing you out by taking up time that you could've spent doing something else... if you need your space, just let me know...I understand how when times are busy/stressful even people you want to be around can seem kinda suffocating...I always have a great time whenever we hang out; sometimes it seems so fleeting because of our schedules, but it definitely makes me look forward to the next time =)
Anyway, drop me a line when you get a chance. I just wanted to let you know what I was thinking (and was wondering what you were thinking too), and I figured e-mail would be a little less intrusive than an IM or a text. Hope you have a good day =)
- Mr. C
Just now, reading over the email, it actually sounds much sweeter than when I first read it. When I first read it, I was furious, mostly out of just sheer frustration that he would keep trying to invading my space. I was also really puzzled as to why an e-mail was less intrusive than IM/text. I really wanted to shoot an email back along the lines of "Mr. C, you're right. I really need my space right now. I'll talk to you later."
Anyways, so I didn't want to say anything over email, so I called him that night. My friend helped me come up with a script that I typed out in front of me so that I would remember what I wanted to say and how to say it. I small talked for a while with "how was work today?" etc. etc. To Mr. C's credit, he is actually pretty perceptive. After a few minutes of small talk, he point blankedly asked, "So are you calling because of my email today?" which made it easy for me to transition into my scripted schpeal.
I essentially told him that I really needed space right now because I am really busy, I have very little time, and that I just don't have time/energy for dating. He asked me "What do you mean by you need some space? Do you want to take things slow? Or do you want to just be friends?"
I hate the phrase "let's just be friends," so I was trying to avoid that, but he pretty much made me say it. So I did, and he was understanding, accepting, and said "sure, no problem. I am fine with whatever you decide to do. I'm also not completely closing the door here either. I know that you are pulled in too many directions right now and that you are really stressed out, so I totally understand you needing to take some time for yourself."
So that's how this fiasco with Mr. C ended. Except he still texts and IMs me. Not as much as before, but just the other night I got a text from him about business school (I was out at a club with friends around 11:30pm on a Thursday night). A couple of days ago, he sent me a link to his photo album of his new corporate apartment in manhattan. Tonight, he IMed me about more business school stuff.
And he still reads my blog.
But at least we're not dating anymore, so I feel no obligations to actually entertain his immense need for attention.
Friday, September 8, 2006
my friend with benefits
Back in April, when I started dating J, he introduced me to a group of his friends. At the time there was a bit of drama within the group with this guy Y and this girl M. They'd been really good friends ever since meeting about 2 years ago, and back in April, both had recently split from serious relationships. Y then wanted to take the relationship beyond friendship, M went along with it for a while, but in the end decided that she needed to be on her own for a while. So Y & M went back to being just friends, with Y being pretty upset about the situation.
During this time, J and I broke up, and I started developing feelings for Y. J and I remained friends, and the group of people he introduced me to, we all geled together into a "clique." My feelings for Y grew, but I really held things back and tried to convince myself otherwise because J and Y are such good friends, and I saw potential for some seriously strained friendships.
Basically, to make a long story short, Y and I started fooling around without any of the others in the friend circle knowing. We'd usually stay the night at one of our places once a week or so. The second time we did this, I mentioned something about "maybe we ought to talk about this." I basically ended up telling him that I really like him, and have liked him for a while. He told me that he still has lots of feelings for M, and he's not sure what will happen to that, and he feels that he's not completely over that saga of his life.
From that point on, we never talked about anything anymore, and we became purely friends with benefits. We'd booty call each other (well, he did most of the calling), fool around for a night, and go back to being regular friends the next morning. Other people in our friend circle kinda caught on to what was happening anyways, but nobody talked about it nor acknowledged it. I did talk to J face to face, to tell him what was going on between Y and me, just to make sure he would be okay with it. He was, and it turned out Y and him had talked already too.
And so that carried on for about two months, and somewhere during this process, I realized that I didn't really like Y anymore. This made me happier because I felt like he was only in the relationship for the physical benefits, and my being on the same page would ensure that there would be no expectations unmet, feelings hurt feelings, and we kinda just settled into this routine of a no-strings-attached physical relationship.
The part that I felt bad about was that I was seeing other people during this time. For example, Y would call me to ask what I was doing Sat night, and if I want to go over and "watch a movie." I would have a date with another guy Sat night, so I would tell Y, "sure, I'm going out to dinner with some people. I'll give you a call and swing by when I'm done." I felt a bit shady having dinner with one guy and then sleeping in Y's bed later in the same night.
I knew that if any of the guys I was actually dating romantically became something more serious, I would have to talk to Y and end the sleep-overs. But nothing ever panned out seriously, so Y and I continued our friends-with-benefits thing. I am actually surprised to say that I have absolutely no emotional feelings for Y. If he were to ask to date me now, I don't think I would do it, despite having been so incredibly attracted to him earlier this summer.
So two nights ago (Wed night), Y calls me to see how I'm doing (I register it as a booty call). I say that I'm stressed out, busy, etc. etc., and I ask how he's doing. He told me that he and M had just had the longest conversation ever sorting out a lot of the tensions/issues still left between them. He sounded really exhausted by the conversation. I wanted to ask him, "do you want to talk about it?" but by then he had already changed the topic. One thing he did say was, "Finally I think that chapter of my life is done."
He then went on to ask me if I want to get dinner sometime, and I told him I'd be free probably Friday night, so he said he would call me Friday (today). He hasn't called yet, and it's already 6pm.
So this got me wondering if he was thinking of taking our relationship further, beyond friends with benefits to a more emotional/romantic relationship. This was a bit worrisome because I don't really want an actual relationship with him.
Ironically, M and I had agreed to get lunch together today. She and I have gotten to be pretty good friends over the course of the summer. (I know all of you are probably raising your eyebrows right now wondering what the heck is wrong with people in this friend circle, why we all hook up with each other and then still are friends with no awkwardness).
M and my lunch convo revolved around Y. She told me a little bit about the conversation she and Y had wednesday night, the mother of all conversations that basically ended everything (I didn't tell her that Y had also mentioned the convo). Then I asked her if things would be awkward between her and Y now, and she said she hoped not, and used J and me as an example. She said that she wanted things between her and Y to be exactly like how J and I ended up.
At one point, she mentioned that Y told her we were dating, which threw me off a little because I never thought of Y and I as dating. Dating has very different connotations from friends-with-benefits. So that was another worrisome fact ...
Now, I'm not sure what to do. It's 6:23pm, Y still hasn't called about dinner. Should I call him? I don't want to because in case he is wanting to make things into more of a romantic relationship, I don't really want to be sending positive signals like my calling him. But then do I just wait around until I get really hungry?
A mutual friend is having a little gathering at her place later tonight (around 9:30pm), and Y forwarded me the invitation, so I know he was planning to go to that. Maybe I should just call and make plans to go to that later and not even mention the dinner ...
During this time, J and I broke up, and I started developing feelings for Y. J and I remained friends, and the group of people he introduced me to, we all geled together into a "clique." My feelings for Y grew, but I really held things back and tried to convince myself otherwise because J and Y are such good friends, and I saw potential for some seriously strained friendships.
Basically, to make a long story short, Y and I started fooling around without any of the others in the friend circle knowing. We'd usually stay the night at one of our places once a week or so. The second time we did this, I mentioned something about "maybe we ought to talk about this." I basically ended up telling him that I really like him, and have liked him for a while. He told me that he still has lots of feelings for M, and he's not sure what will happen to that, and he feels that he's not completely over that saga of his life.
From that point on, we never talked about anything anymore, and we became purely friends with benefits. We'd booty call each other (well, he did most of the calling), fool around for a night, and go back to being regular friends the next morning. Other people in our friend circle kinda caught on to what was happening anyways, but nobody talked about it nor acknowledged it. I did talk to J face to face, to tell him what was going on between Y and me, just to make sure he would be okay with it. He was, and it turned out Y and him had talked already too.
And so that carried on for about two months, and somewhere during this process, I realized that I didn't really like Y anymore. This made me happier because I felt like he was only in the relationship for the physical benefits, and my being on the same page would ensure that there would be no expectations unmet, feelings hurt feelings, and we kinda just settled into this routine of a no-strings-attached physical relationship.
The part that I felt bad about was that I was seeing other people during this time. For example, Y would call me to ask what I was doing Sat night, and if I want to go over and "watch a movie." I would have a date with another guy Sat night, so I would tell Y, "sure, I'm going out to dinner with some people. I'll give you a call and swing by when I'm done." I felt a bit shady having dinner with one guy and then sleeping in Y's bed later in the same night.
I knew that if any of the guys I was actually dating romantically became something more serious, I would have to talk to Y and end the sleep-overs. But nothing ever panned out seriously, so Y and I continued our friends-with-benefits thing. I am actually surprised to say that I have absolutely no emotional feelings for Y. If he were to ask to date me now, I don't think I would do it, despite having been so incredibly attracted to him earlier this summer.
So two nights ago (Wed night), Y calls me to see how I'm doing (I register it as a booty call). I say that I'm stressed out, busy, etc. etc., and I ask how he's doing. He told me that he and M had just had the longest conversation ever sorting out a lot of the tensions/issues still left between them. He sounded really exhausted by the conversation. I wanted to ask him, "do you want to talk about it?" but by then he had already changed the topic. One thing he did say was, "Finally I think that chapter of my life is done."
He then went on to ask me if I want to get dinner sometime, and I told him I'd be free probably Friday night, so he said he would call me Friday (today). He hasn't called yet, and it's already 6pm.
So this got me wondering if he was thinking of taking our relationship further, beyond friends with benefits to a more emotional/romantic relationship. This was a bit worrisome because I don't really want an actual relationship with him.
Ironically, M and I had agreed to get lunch together today. She and I have gotten to be pretty good friends over the course of the summer. (I know all of you are probably raising your eyebrows right now wondering what the heck is wrong with people in this friend circle, why we all hook up with each other and then still are friends with no awkwardness).
M and my lunch convo revolved around Y. She told me a little bit about the conversation she and Y had wednesday night, the mother of all conversations that basically ended everything (I didn't tell her that Y had also mentioned the convo). Then I asked her if things would be awkward between her and Y now, and she said she hoped not, and used J and me as an example. She said that she wanted things between her and Y to be exactly like how J and I ended up.
At one point, she mentioned that Y told her we were dating, which threw me off a little because I never thought of Y and I as dating. Dating has very different connotations from friends-with-benefits. So that was another worrisome fact ...
Now, I'm not sure what to do. It's 6:23pm, Y still hasn't called about dinner. Should I call him? I don't want to because in case he is wanting to make things into more of a romantic relationship, I don't really want to be sending positive signals like my calling him. But then do I just wait around until I get really hungry?
A mutual friend is having a little gathering at her place later tonight (around 9:30pm), and Y forwarded me the invitation, so I know he was planning to go to that. Maybe I should just call and make plans to go to that later and not even mention the dinner ...
Wednesday, September 6, 2006
Irish
And the chronicles continue with Irish ...
Irish and I met in January, taking a snowboarding class that was offered through our school together. I remember meeting him on the bus and thinking, "I wonder if he'll become a character in my life." Sure enough, by the end of the first lesson, we were talking like we'd known each other for years.
By January, I had already dated a couple of guys since the October Breakup that I knew one of the most important criteria for me is that I need to feel like I could talk to him forever. Irish was the epitome of this. I remember we'd spend whole Sunday afternoons walking along the Charles river talking about anything and everything. We'd only stop because either or both of us had something we had to do, an appointment to fulfill. Whenever the time came for us to part, neither one of us would ever want to leave, and we'd try to prolong our conversations as much as possible.
At one point or another, I definitely asked myself what my feelings were toward Irish. Was it just friendship? Was it something more? I felt like we connected so well on our life outlooks, career goals, life priorities, our views on people, that we seemed like we were made for each other. He was a rare soul mate whom I had found.
Except, I wasn't physically attracted to him. As much as I wanted to be so that I could push our relationship toward a romantic one, I just wasn't. So I stopped thinking about Irish in that way, continued to have long, deep, soul-searching conversations with him, but I left our relationship at one of friendship.
And so the days went on, until one night toward the end of February, he confronted me and told me that he was in love with me. He said that he'd pretty much wanted to be with me from the moment he met me, and that he had gone back and forth on his feelings, but in the end knew that he was just in denial about things when he tried to convince himself we were just friends. He wanted to go beyond friendship and take me out on a real date.
Being the typical romantic girl that I was, I found it hard to turn down such an offer. Here was a guy whom I had gotten to know so well, whom I can feel so comfortable around, whom I could talk nonstop to for 7+ hours without even knowing how much time has passed, whom I had such amazing connections with, whom I considered a soul mate ... Here was this guy professing his love for me, how could I possibly turn that down?
I melted and started dating Irish. After a couple of dates however, the physical attraction issue resurfaced for me. I still wasn't physically attracted to him. Irish isn't bad looking: tall, blonde, and best of all, he had an amazing Irish accent. But he's chubby. And chubbiness is one of those traits that I have very low tolerances for (ugh, my superficiality, I know). I remember thinking what it would be like to wake up next to him, and I would always think about the fat that would also be there to greet me, and that became the deal-breaker. I realized that if I couldn't imagine myself happily waking up to him, no matter how great I felt like we connected otherwise, that lack of physical attraction bordering on slight repulsion would always be a thorn that would likely never go away.
I felt terrible about how superficial I was. I struggle a lot with throwing away a chance with an awesome who seemed like the perfect match for me: personality, chivalry, compassion, wit, intelligence, humbleness; he had a good head on his shoulders, had everything I could possibly want in someone I'm dating ... but I just wasn't physically attracted to him AT ALL. In fact, I was a bit repulsed by his chubbiness.
So I told him that things wouldn't work for us romantically, that I only saw him as a friend, and we went back to being friends. We were both mature enough that there was very little awkwardness, and we continued to spend lots of time together as just friends. There was always that little bit of tension though because I knew he still liked me as more than a friend. I want to say that I never used that, but when I look back, I probably did. If I wanted to do something that I was fairly certain none of my friends would want to do, I would call Irish knowing that he would almost certainly go with me.
Irish went home to Ireland for the summer. All summer long, we emailed back and forth, and on multiple occasions he would tell me that he really missed me. Me, I dated a bunch of people all summer long, none of whom things worked out with. Whenever something ended, I would get mildly depressed wondering if I would ever find someone to settle down with before I turn 40. Whenever I got mildly depressed, I would think of Irish and think about how I always had him to be there to take me and to be with me forever if it ever came down to that.
He got back to Boston late last week, and we've hung out tons already. Sunday night, my group of friends went on a cruise around the harbor, which really is just a glorified club on a boat. He came with us and hung out at one of my friends' place afterwards. We were sitting on the floor, and at one point, he saw I was uncomfortable with the pillow I had, so he offered his shoulder and said "you know, my shoulder is much more comfortable." So I laid on his shoulder, and he had his arms around me, and it just felt nice. It felt right.
Last night, we went for another one of our marathon walks around the river. We started around midnight, and we finally went home because it was 4am, and I was starting to fall asleep. We talked about lots of things that were very introspective about ourselves and our relationships with those around us. When we were saying good bye, he gave me a huge hug, and I kind of just paused ... looking up at him. I wasn't sure what I was doing, but part of me really wanted him to lean in and kiss me. I think he wanted to, but he held back out of propriety.
I still don't know what to think about Irish. I feel like I need only to give him the signal, and he and I would be together instantly. But my superficiality won't let me get over the chubbiness. Irish has three brothers, all of whom are tall, lean, blonde, beautiful. Over the last 6 months, I have found myself wishing, on more than one occasion, that Irish could have gotten his brothers' good looks as well.
Irish and I met in January, taking a snowboarding class that was offered through our school together. I remember meeting him on the bus and thinking, "I wonder if he'll become a character in my life." Sure enough, by the end of the first lesson, we were talking like we'd known each other for years.
By January, I had already dated a couple of guys since the October Breakup that I knew one of the most important criteria for me is that I need to feel like I could talk to him forever. Irish was the epitome of this. I remember we'd spend whole Sunday afternoons walking along the Charles river talking about anything and everything. We'd only stop because either or both of us had something we had to do, an appointment to fulfill. Whenever the time came for us to part, neither one of us would ever want to leave, and we'd try to prolong our conversations as much as possible.
At one point or another, I definitely asked myself what my feelings were toward Irish. Was it just friendship? Was it something more? I felt like we connected so well on our life outlooks, career goals, life priorities, our views on people, that we seemed like we were made for each other. He was a rare soul mate whom I had found.
Except, I wasn't physically attracted to him. As much as I wanted to be so that I could push our relationship toward a romantic one, I just wasn't. So I stopped thinking about Irish in that way, continued to have long, deep, soul-searching conversations with him, but I left our relationship at one of friendship.
And so the days went on, until one night toward the end of February, he confronted me and told me that he was in love with me. He said that he'd pretty much wanted to be with me from the moment he met me, and that he had gone back and forth on his feelings, but in the end knew that he was just in denial about things when he tried to convince himself we were just friends. He wanted to go beyond friendship and take me out on a real date.
Being the typical romantic girl that I was, I found it hard to turn down such an offer. Here was a guy whom I had gotten to know so well, whom I can feel so comfortable around, whom I could talk nonstop to for 7+ hours without even knowing how much time has passed, whom I had such amazing connections with, whom I considered a soul mate ... Here was this guy professing his love for me, how could I possibly turn that down?
I melted and started dating Irish. After a couple of dates however, the physical attraction issue resurfaced for me. I still wasn't physically attracted to him. Irish isn't bad looking: tall, blonde, and best of all, he had an amazing Irish accent. But he's chubby. And chubbiness is one of those traits that I have very low tolerances for (ugh, my superficiality, I know). I remember thinking what it would be like to wake up next to him, and I would always think about the fat that would also be there to greet me, and that became the deal-breaker. I realized that if I couldn't imagine myself happily waking up to him, no matter how great I felt like we connected otherwise, that lack of physical attraction bordering on slight repulsion would always be a thorn that would likely never go away.
I felt terrible about how superficial I was. I struggle a lot with throwing away a chance with an awesome who seemed like the perfect match for me: personality, chivalry, compassion, wit, intelligence, humbleness; he had a good head on his shoulders, had everything I could possibly want in someone I'm dating ... but I just wasn't physically attracted to him AT ALL. In fact, I was a bit repulsed by his chubbiness.
So I told him that things wouldn't work for us romantically, that I only saw him as a friend, and we went back to being friends. We were both mature enough that there was very little awkwardness, and we continued to spend lots of time together as just friends. There was always that little bit of tension though because I knew he still liked me as more than a friend. I want to say that I never used that, but when I look back, I probably did. If I wanted to do something that I was fairly certain none of my friends would want to do, I would call Irish knowing that he would almost certainly go with me.
Irish went home to Ireland for the summer. All summer long, we emailed back and forth, and on multiple occasions he would tell me that he really missed me. Me, I dated a bunch of people all summer long, none of whom things worked out with. Whenever something ended, I would get mildly depressed wondering if I would ever find someone to settle down with before I turn 40. Whenever I got mildly depressed, I would think of Irish and think about how I always had him to be there to take me and to be with me forever if it ever came down to that.
He got back to Boston late last week, and we've hung out tons already. Sunday night, my group of friends went on a cruise around the harbor, which really is just a glorified club on a boat. He came with us and hung out at one of my friends' place afterwards. We were sitting on the floor, and at one point, he saw I was uncomfortable with the pillow I had, so he offered his shoulder and said "you know, my shoulder is much more comfortable." So I laid on his shoulder, and he had his arms around me, and it just felt nice. It felt right.
Last night, we went for another one of our marathon walks around the river. We started around midnight, and we finally went home because it was 4am, and I was starting to fall asleep. We talked about lots of things that were very introspective about ourselves and our relationships with those around us. When we were saying good bye, he gave me a huge hug, and I kind of just paused ... looking up at him. I wasn't sure what I was doing, but part of me really wanted him to lean in and kiss me. I think he wanted to, but he held back out of propriety.
I still don't know what to think about Irish. I feel like I need only to give him the signal, and he and I would be together instantly. But my superficiality won't let me get over the chubbiness. Irish has three brothers, all of whom are tall, lean, blonde, beautiful. Over the last 6 months, I have found myself wishing, on more than one occasion, that Irish could have gotten his brothers' good looks as well.
Saturday, September 2, 2006
where to start?
Where do I even begin with the stories? I've decided that this will mainly be my dating blog. Is that weird? To have a blog dedicated to men I date and my over-analysis of situations? Actually, I think I've gotten better about not over-analyzing things, and in general not being all that needy, at least initiatlly anyways.
I guess I'll start with the recent no-go's:
1) Guy who can't take a hint
This is a friend of a friend whom I've actually known for about a year now. We went camping together at the end of July with some mutual friends, and I sensed an interest on his part. Recently he asked me, through email, "maybe we can grab a bite to eat sometime?" I wasn't sure if that was his way of asking me out on a date or just a friend wanting to catch up ... either way, maybe against my better judgement, I agreed.
Throughout dinner, I tried hard to play everything very casually. I even brought up dating as a conversation topic, thinking that to usually be a taboo topic for a date, hoping to show him that I really didn't see this dinner as a date for the two of us. When the bill arrived, I picked up the majority of it because neither one of us had change. I thought all of those hints, especially the bill, were pretty clear that I was not interested in anything more than friendship.
Maybe he talked to a friend who clued him into the fact that he probably should have paid for dinner because he sent me an email a couple of days later, "blah blah blah, blah blah blah. Let me know if you're free this coming week; I'd like to take you out to dinner." Hey, at least he's clear and assertive this time. Too bad it's still email, and too bad I'm still not interested. I shoot an email back "Sorry, I'm busy this week" with no suggestion of an alternative time or activity, thinking that surely this would be hint enough.
A day later, he emails back, "How about next week?" Ugh, I had no choice but to respond "Sorry, I'm busy next week, too." I felt so awkward doing that, and when the hints get to that point, they're not really even hints anymore, they're just euphemisms and my avoiding actually saying the dreadful "let's just be friends." I think he finally got the hint because I haven't heard back from him since that last email.
2) Guy who thinks he's a good cook
This guy was pretty smooth. I've known him for maybe a couple of months, and we ran into each other at the campus pub a couple of weeks ago. He kept telling how great of a cook he is as we talked, and I was trying not to engage him, so I just kept saying "oh, that's cool" and just leaving the conversation at that. Somewhere during our convo, he asked me for my number (this is the smooth part). As copied from my other blog:
him: You’ve been text messaging all night.
me: yeah, I know. It’s fun.
him: I feel like I should pull out my phone and text you
me: haha
him: but I don’t have your number
me: …
I didn't give him my number, but because we knew each other from stuff around campus, he knew my email and emailed me the next day: "I don't think you believed me last night when I said I was a good cook, so I'd like to invite you over for dinner sometime and try it out first hand. I'm free THIS day and THIS day, let me know what works for you."
I emailed back and said "Don't worry, I believed you when you said you're a good cook. I won't make you prove it :) I'll see you around campus!"
He got the hint.
3) Guy 2 degrees removed
I have a childhood friend in town who is a bit of a princess who calls me a lot to hang out. I don't do it often because she's very high maintenance, but finally some friends and I were going out to a club a Friday night three weeks ago, so I called her to invite her along. She brings her boyfriend, and also 3 of her boyfriend's friends. I kinda hit it off with one of the bf's friends, who asks me for my number by the end of the night.
He waited until mid-week to call, and asked me to do drinks/dinner on Friday night. I already had plans, so I suggested Sunday brunch instead, and he agreed. He picks me up (in his beamer), and we go get brunch. At the end, we split the bill. Maybe it's my southern upbringing, but a guy who doesn't foot the bill on a first date doesn't make a great impression with me. It wasn't even expensive ($10 a person for food, tax, tip, everything), AND he works. Anyways, I wasn't really feeling any chemistry anyways, so I wasn't expecting any more meetings.
He left town for a family vacation the day after our brunch date and just got back early this week. He called on Wednesday; I screened his call, and he left a voice mail saying that he's back in the US and was wondering what my plans for the weekend are, and maybe we can get together sometime. I never called him back, which I feel pretty terrible about. (I hate being a flake, and not calling back is being a flake ... but what else could I have done?)
I guess I'll start with the recent no-go's:
1) Guy who can't take a hint
This is a friend of a friend whom I've actually known for about a year now. We went camping together at the end of July with some mutual friends, and I sensed an interest on his part. Recently he asked me, through email, "maybe we can grab a bite to eat sometime?" I wasn't sure if that was his way of asking me out on a date or just a friend wanting to catch up ... either way, maybe against my better judgement, I agreed.
Throughout dinner, I tried hard to play everything very casually. I even brought up dating as a conversation topic, thinking that to usually be a taboo topic for a date, hoping to show him that I really didn't see this dinner as a date for the two of us. When the bill arrived, I picked up the majority of it because neither one of us had change. I thought all of those hints, especially the bill, were pretty clear that I was not interested in anything more than friendship.
Maybe he talked to a friend who clued him into the fact that he probably should have paid for dinner because he sent me an email a couple of days later, "blah blah blah, blah blah blah. Let me know if you're free this coming week; I'd like to take you out to dinner." Hey, at least he's clear and assertive this time. Too bad it's still email, and too bad I'm still not interested. I shoot an email back "Sorry, I'm busy this week" with no suggestion of an alternative time or activity, thinking that surely this would be hint enough.
A day later, he emails back, "How about next week?" Ugh, I had no choice but to respond "Sorry, I'm busy next week, too." I felt so awkward doing that, and when the hints get to that point, they're not really even hints anymore, they're just euphemisms and my avoiding actually saying the dreadful "let's just be friends." I think he finally got the hint because I haven't heard back from him since that last email.
2) Guy who thinks he's a good cook
This guy was pretty smooth. I've known him for maybe a couple of months, and we ran into each other at the campus pub a couple of weeks ago. He kept telling how great of a cook he is as we talked, and I was trying not to engage him, so I just kept saying "oh, that's cool" and just leaving the conversation at that. Somewhere during our convo, he asked me for my number (this is the smooth part). As copied from my other blog:
him: You’ve been text messaging all night.
me: yeah, I know. It’s fun.
him: I feel like I should pull out my phone and text you
me: haha
him: but I don’t have your number
me: …
I didn't give him my number, but because we knew each other from stuff around campus, he knew my email and emailed me the next day: "I don't think you believed me last night when I said I was a good cook, so I'd like to invite you over for dinner sometime and try it out first hand. I'm free THIS day and THIS day, let me know what works for you."
I emailed back and said "Don't worry, I believed you when you said you're a good cook. I won't make you prove it :) I'll see you around campus!"
He got the hint.
3) Guy 2 degrees removed
I have a childhood friend in town who is a bit of a princess who calls me a lot to hang out. I don't do it often because she's very high maintenance, but finally some friends and I were going out to a club a Friday night three weeks ago, so I called her to invite her along. She brings her boyfriend, and also 3 of her boyfriend's friends. I kinda hit it off with one of the bf's friends, who asks me for my number by the end of the night.
He waited until mid-week to call, and asked me to do drinks/dinner on Friday night. I already had plans, so I suggested Sunday brunch instead, and he agreed. He picks me up (in his beamer), and we go get brunch. At the end, we split the bill. Maybe it's my southern upbringing, but a guy who doesn't foot the bill on a first date doesn't make a great impression with me. It wasn't even expensive ($10 a person for food, tax, tip, everything), AND he works. Anyways, I wasn't really feeling any chemistry anyways, so I wasn't expecting any more meetings.
He left town for a family vacation the day after our brunch date and just got back early this week. He called on Wednesday; I screened his call, and he left a voice mail saying that he's back in the US and was wondering what my plans for the weekend are, and maybe we can get together sometime. I never called him back, which I feel pretty terrible about. (I hate being a flake, and not calling back is being a flake ... but what else could I have done?)
Friday, September 1, 2006
motivation
The motivation for this blog stems from my need for anonymity, a place for me to document those thoughts and events that I don't want my acquaintances to read about, a place where I can complain about people without fearing that they may read the story.
Why didn't I just start a diary?
1) Select close friends will know about this blog, and I plan to use some aspects of posts to update them on what is going on in my life (particularly my dating life)
2) One of the main draws of blogs is the community of readers who mutually comment and keep track of each others' lives. I like that, and I can't do that with a private diary.
So what's with MINICHAMP? It's something that my ex-boyfriend called me. This is the ex-boyfriend, the love of my life, the person I thought I was going to marry, and whom I thought would propose this summer. It turned out that after 2.5 years together, during which time, neither one of our religious beliefs changed, he finally told me that he didn't think he could marry someone non-Christian. So what the hell were you thinking the past 2.5 years??
But I guess deep down, I still want to believe that I'm a minichamp ... a bit of a feisty champion (don't let my size fool you). So here I am, navigating the world of men and dating afresh since the Breakup last October. Here are the chronicles. My only regret is that I didn't start writing this blog this sooner. So many good stories gone.
Why didn't I just start a diary?
1) Select close friends will know about this blog, and I plan to use some aspects of posts to update them on what is going on in my life (particularly my dating life)
2) One of the main draws of blogs is the community of readers who mutually comment and keep track of each others' lives. I like that, and I can't do that with a private diary.
So what's with MINICHAMP? It's something that my ex-boyfriend called me. This is the ex-boyfriend, the love of my life, the person I thought I was going to marry, and whom I thought would propose this summer. It turned out that after 2.5 years together, during which time, neither one of our religious beliefs changed, he finally told me that he didn't think he could marry someone non-Christian. So what the hell were you thinking the past 2.5 years??
But I guess deep down, I still want to believe that I'm a minichamp ... a bit of a feisty champion (don't let my size fool you). So here I am, navigating the world of men and dating afresh since the Breakup last October. Here are the chronicles. My only regret is that I didn't start writing this blog this sooner. So many good stories gone.
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