BELLS AREN'T RINGING

As per my last post, it should be no surprise that I didn’t remember a so-so date from at least six years ago with Mr. Ten-Year-Old Photos. That guy seems stuck in the past, but I typically have only fuzzy recollections of things that have brought me to where I am today. It amazes me when someone writes a memoir detailing not just decade-old conversations, but the color of their date’s socks and the patterns of drapes in the hallway they momentarily passed through. Good god. Embellish much?

 

Really, why would a so-so date linger? My brain has to be brutally selective in what it holds onto because I can’t go freeing up space by chucking random facts I yell at the TV while watching “Jeopardy,” even if such “facts” regularly put me in negative territory. I didn’t want to play Final Jeopardy anyway! (“I’ll take Sore Losers for $1,000, Alex.[1]”)  

 

As I searched “Victoria” on my blog for any mention of Mr. So-So, other posts came up. Pre-COVID, I went to Victoria a couple times a year. I skimmed but didn’t feel like reading them since that wasn’t my purpose. But then I came upon a December 2014 coffee date with another guy, Saul, who’d just moved to Vancouver from Victoria. 

 

Now THAT was a coffee date! 

 

There was something adorable about Saul. I could tell from what I’d written that we’d clicked. The coffee date continued and evolved into dinner and, during dinner, “I reached my hand across the table and held his.”

 

WHAT?! 

 

I like physical affection, but it’s hard for me to do in public. Maybe things would have been different if I’d made a habit of that early on, but my high school years in East Texas didn’t involve dating a girl, exchanging class rings, letting her wear my letter jacket and fawning all over each other in the courtyard like everyone else seemed to do as a rite of passage. Later, after escaping Texas, I still feared I’d be gay-bashed if I held hands with a guy or so much as pinkie-swapped. For me to take initiative and hold a guy’s hand—ON A FIRST DATE!—well, I’m glad I wrote that down because otherwise I’d say that could never have happened. Pure fabrication like the pattern of those hallway drapes from yesteryear.

 

And that’s the thing. Did it happen? 

 

Not just the hand holding but the entire first date. Logically, I know it did. I could never have made up that date. I’d have never put in the hand holding moment because I would have known it defied credibility. Fictional me would have to be something like me; otherwise, I’d just post shirtless shots of Matt Bomer, saying I’m his doppelganger and writing about my orgies with at least five of People magazine’s Sexiest Men Alive. (I’d uses aliases, of course. Names like, oh…Bryan Reynolds and Huey Rackman and Ritchie Gear.[2])

 

I LOVED rereading the account of my delightful date with Saul, but I don’t remember anything at all about that. Being as it was a hand-holding first date, it should be in my personal dating Hall of Fame. (What a sad hall of fame that would be. Most definitely not a hall; more appropriately, the back corner of a shelf, perhaps in my fridge beside that four-year-old jar of sauerkraut.) 

 

What makes recalling Saul more challenging beyond that fact I seem to have a generally faulty memory—I’ll admit to now feeling a tad panicky—is that I never use people’s actual names when I blog. Just like with “Huey Rackman,” I don’t get ridiculous about it. These aren’t Russian spies I’m writing about. (Not knowingly, anyway.) I don’t rename George as Bubba and I don’t rechristen Al as Engelbert.[3] Usually, the name I use rhymes or begins with the same first letter but, in this case, “Paul” didn’t ring any bells either. U-Haul?! (No parent would be that cruel, even if that’s where the kid was conceived.) Running through the list of “S” list from Sacha to Sylvester got me nowhere.[4] Not Saul but…

 

Stumped.

 

I read subsequent blog posts. I needed Saul, Part 2. Saul cannot be a one-date guy.

 

But he was. 

 

He got a mention two weeks later when I wrote, “Despite a good start, I expect nothing more to come of it. The occasional message becomes more detached. I’m not as interested and, no doubt, neither is he.” These are saving face words. You can’t fire me; I quit. Sure, if you say so.

 

I don’t know if I was crestfallen then, but I am now. He wasn’t “the one that got away,” but he was certainly one that got away. Perhaps I knew it at the time. Perhaps repressed memory was my best way of coping.

 

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[1] RIP, Mr. Trebek, in my mind, the one and only host.

[2] Blake Shelton? Seriously?! 2017 was unlucky enough to host Trump’s inauguration. “Sexy” Blake adds insult to injury. 2017 is still waiting on that retraction, People.

[3] Makes me think of all those celebrities who thought they had to change their names for a shot at becoming famous, e.g., Marilyn Monroe, née Norma Jean Mortenson; Rock Hudson, née Roy Harold Scherer, Jr.; Elmo née Red Sock. (I made up that last one just to see if anyone other than me reads footnotes.) Seriously, if Engelbert Humperdink can have a successful music career, there are no name barriers, unless your sadist parents have a certain last name and put “Adolf, Jr.” on your birth certificate.

[4] If anyone knows a decent single gay guy named Shaw, shoot me an email. I would DEFINITELY hold hands with a guy named Shaw on a first date. If he let me. 

CAUTION: COOKIE

Sometimes when you’re too excited about a fresh cookie, one that is still piping hot from the oven, you burn your tongue. One must exercise a little willpower. Let things cool.

The same goes for dates.

I had another very good first date. (This is becoming very familiar. Why aren’t they asking for seconds?!) Saul has only been in Vancouver four days, having just moved from Victoria. He messaged me on Plenty of Fish. He’s eight years older, but in his profile pics, he appeared fit, younger than his age and endearingly smiley. Yeah, yeah. Photos can be so deceptive. I decided to hop on a ferry and meet him in Gastown. I needed to take a bunch of photos of older Vancouver buildings to give me a feel for a historical piece I’m writing so I figured now would be a good time to do that groundwork and cross off another online possibility. And I set my favorite bakery as our meeting place so, even if the date fizzled, I’d still have a sweet aftertaste.

Saul walked in and looked as young and smiley in person as in his pics. Well, hurrah. At first, I wasn’t terribly invested in the conversation. He talked too fast, too long and with too much detail about technical things. (He had listed science as an interest on his profile. Not my forte at all.) I figured, okay, this will be a pleasant coffee and that will be the end of it.

But there was a geeky charm to him as he caught a breath and said, “I’m talking too fast, aren’t I? I had caffeine already. Normally I only drink decaf.” Blame it on the joe. He then opened up about already having a bad coffee date only hours earlier. It comes with being the New Kid in Town. Fresh cookies always draw that initial surge of salivating suitors. That date lasted ten minutes with the other guy declaring, “Everything you would ever want is right here in me. But you’re not making enough eye contact. You’re obviously not interested.” Exit tightly wound single guy.

Somehow the story made me warm to Saul. Most men don’t open up about a same-day date, particularly one that ends so badly.

I knew Saul was interested in me. Maybe any guy would look good after that morning date. Maybe Saul spent the time in between practicing his eye contact. But he also showed interest in the way he’d touch me as we talked—naturally leaning into me as he joked and holding my hands to see if they were cold from this sudden spell of winter weather.

When the bakery closed, I still wanted to take some more photos so he walked his bike and strolled with me as we sauntered along Hastings, the worst blocks in Canada. As we casually meandered through a mixed crowd of mentally ill/homeless/addicted people, I realized that this was neither a romantic walk nor a proper “Welcome to Vancouver” excursion. I should have taken us on a less direct route to Chinatown. But I’m not used to thinking about travel for more than one. Saul gamely acted nonchalant. Even better, he went on a political tangent about the rights of the least fortunate and the failings of the Harper government. “Please tell me you’re not Conservative,” he said. “I’d have to end it right here.” I’m not. But he wouldn’t have.

He was clearly freezing—visibly shivering—but he waited patiently as I snapped pictures of historical buildings that were on my list. As the skies darkened, we ambled along the seawall, heading back towards his place. “Can I make you dinner?” he asked. I politely declined. I’m too finicky an eater. Can’t divulge all my quirks on the first date. “Can we go out for dinner?” Sure. Persistence, when it’s the right guy, can be sexy.

All this time, we’d sat and walked side by side. Now at dinner we faced each other. And the connection seemed stronger. I reached my hand across the table and held his. “I like this,” I said. Simple, yet significant.

“Me, too.”

I had to walk fifteen minutes from the restaurant to catch a bus to make the last ferry home. “I’ll walk you there,” he insisted. “And it wouldn’t be so bad if you missed it.”

Maybe not. But the evening ended at the bus stop with several hugs and a quick kiss. Fresh cook out of the oven. I’ve got a tongue to protect. Everything feels comfortable and I hope a second date does happen. I’ve learned that there’s a vast unknown between first date and what may or may not come next. He is a fresh cookie and I still have a couple other first dates pending. It’s a promising beginning. We’ll see if there’s a next.