I’ve joked many times that I’ve met so many guys for coffee from online dating sites, that I might have to switch to tea. At what point does coffee leave such a bitter aftertaste that it can’t be sweetened by a dozen packets of sugar? (Or stevia, if that’s your thing.)
I’ve gone on two post-vaccination meet-and-greets with guys from Plenty of Fish. No coffee. For the first one, everything was perfectly pleasant, but I knew we weren’t a match, not as boyfriends, not as friends.
On Friday evening, I met John under a strange art installation that looks to me like a bicycle seat. (Vancouver’s public art is hit and miss, mostly miss.) If nothing else, the thing offered shelter. It had poured rain all day and things hadn’t let up by 6 p.m. The plan had been to maybe grab a drink—John had suggested tea—and walk part of the seawall. What Vancouver lacks in art, it more than makes up for in natural beauty. There was a café still open right by the bike seat thingy, plenty of covered outdoor seating. John didn’t want to sit or grab a drink. Instead, we would walk in the rain. All good. I had my umbrella, my Rains jacket and my waterproof Vessa shoes. (No, I’m not getting paid for product placement.) John’s shoes were definitely not water resistant, but he said he was fine. His mother would not have been pleased but okey dokey.
This was a date I knew we’d both been looking forward to. Sometimes you just get a good sense of things through the messages exchanged leading up to meeting. His profile had full paragraphs. (That’s not so hard, guys. Make the effort!) He’d included a quote above his profile and said, “Bonus points if you can identify its source.” In the Google world, that seemed too easy. I felt it was more fun to go old-school and use my imagination so my guess was Grover from “Sesame Street” and, if not him, then his Muppet colleague, Animal.
I should mention that John’s profile also mentioned he was an elementary school teacher and one of his photos was a crayon portrait drawn by a student.
John LOVED my reference. Incidentally, the quote was from “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes,” a 1953 movie starring Jane Russell and Marilyn Monroe. I know I’m supposed to have seen this flick since it’s the one in which Marilyn sings “Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend” that’s scene Madonna pays homage to in “Material Girl.” I’m a bad gay. Lance Bass and a drag queen named Benny Boop just came to my door and took away my Pride flag. (What? You really think Lance had anything else to do? He was very apologetic—a gig’s a gig—and politely asked that I sign the online petition for an NSYNC reunion.)
I figured John and I would have plenty to talk about since we’d both spent many years working in elementary schools. With the school year just starting, he would have some amusing and precious stories about the kids and I could be a sympathetic ear to listen about how exhausted he felt getting back into it. (The first month is always rewarding but also somewhat painful as the pace is so sloooow, introducing all the routines and fielding kids’ questions about whether they can use their brand-new back-to-school purple pens and glitter glue for all assignments.)
We walked. We talked. Both of us had our jeans soaked through from below the knee. John’s shoes reached that sad level of sogginess unbecoming to even an abandoned bowl of Cheerios.
Nothing connected.
He’d ask a question. I’d answer. I’d ask a question. He’d answer. There were obvious follow-up questions, but neither of us went there. There was nothing terrible about it. No friction. No coldness. Altogether, it was a forty-five-minute shrug.
Maybe caffeine matters.
I had a very nice coffee the next morning. No bitterness, no sugar added. My drink of choice remains unspoiled, my favorite cafés remain unharmed.
I’m hoping that, on my next meet-and-greet, I feel something…like when I view that giant bicycle seat (or whatever it is) art piece. Feeling good would be great, but bad wouldn’t be so awful at this point. Something needs to register or why bother?
Maybe some of us are rusty at the dating game after all those months masked and locked down. Maybe that long, long pause offered new perspective. Maybe we realized that dating isn’t that much of a need anymore.
I just logged in again to Plenty of Fish. No message from John. (Whew. That would have been awkward.) I noticed there’s a guy with “bomber” in his profile name—um, what?—and I have a message from chase_booty (Full text: “Hello Handsom”).
Yeah, lockdown wasn’t all that bad.
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