Category: excellentlocation

Boy 9: Troll

You’re an economist, and you win most texting.

Thousands sent, EASILY, thousands,before we actually met. Probably because I was bored on a plane, and you were bored… ’cause that’s your default state? But no spoilers.

It’s not surprising that I thought you might be a troll.

The theme of our texting was basically… disappointment. How disappointing it’s going to be to actually meet in person. It’s funny in a morbid kind of way. Endearing nihilism… turns out you’ve been online dating for five years. I am easily fascinated… who is this internet veteran? An excellent date or a horrifying dud?

Lots of meta-Hinging about horrible dates, Jewish jokes, innuendo… Banter: high. Substance: low. I guess I did figure out that you’re bilingual like me. That’s sexy.

We settle on a date for when I return from work that’s post-Passover Seder.

Even after logistics have been confirmed, the texting continues. Selfies… sarcasm. What’s the best way to disappoint each other, hmmm?

Somewhere in this conversation, I drop the fact that I have a new dealbreaker. I will not get emotionally/sexually involved (in any capacity) with a guy who hasn’t told someone that they love them romantically. Everything else I can wrap my head around, but at this point, if you haven’t loved someone and differentiated that personal maze for yourself, then I’m not going to provide you with a training ground. And I want you to recognize your own limitations and preferences within our dynamic/relationship and whether it’s casual or serious or anything in between.

You assure me that you were with someone for a year…***

After many pithy little comments about how it might be better not to meet and preserve what we have projected on each other, we finally meet. At one of my favorite bars in NYC: ArtBar.

Boy 9, you basically look like your picture. Not quite. B+.

I ask you questions about your job. You answer them. You seem to care about it. You work on economic proposals for an environmentally-conscious firm. But you work remotely which means you work and live alone… somehow jokes about oral sex get made and that you give it poorly. Or not at all. Yellow flag.

You ask me about my work. I answer a bit. We get derailed with peripheral and tangential jokes…

Interesting thing about you, Boy 9. The excessive texting did actually reflect you well. Banter: high. Substance: low. In person and via text.

But let’s get back to disappointment. We had discussed many things, including but not limited to the fact that you tend to kiss on first dates, and 8/8 of boys texted me after the first date but did not kiss me! So, I was expecting you to kiss me if I didn’t “disappoint.” Am I crazy?

You don’t kiss me! But you do walk me all the way across town instead of taking the subway.

I get on the bus. Text me, I say.

I want to thank you:

  1. You’re weird. I haven’t really met any truly strange birds. I like that you put yourself out there.
  2. You’re a fascinating manifestation of online dating culture–you’ve been on the apps for years–and the way it reflects the deep loneliness many professions can cultivate. Troll isn’t quite right, but it isn’t quite wrong, either. You work alone (computers make the work remote), you live alone (one bedrooms mean you’re more successful), and you date alone (apps mean a revolving digital door of strangers). I see your solitude, and I am grateful for my community.

Boy 9, I could sleep with you but only out of morbid curiosity and that unhealthy teaspoon of self-destruction that every hopeless neurotic contains.

UPDATE: You text instantly. It’s weird. The texting continues… I accuse you of disliking me because you didn’t kiss me. You accuse me of recoiling when you made physical contact with me. I don’t remember you touching me… good sign, right?

Somehow a second date is scheduled. Wondering if it was disappointing? You have no idea. I guess I’m a glutton for murky disappointment. I’ll follow a story all the way to Brooklyn. More on that later.

***Turns out to not be accurate, later, unsurprisingly…

Boy 6: Block Ice and Books

Boy 6, you were one of the first people I clicked.

Your pictures are all sort of weird, but you said that your personal brand was a young Larry David… and… well, what can I say.

You’re in tech. Hot.

You were a click whim.

You initiated a conversation. Harry Potter banter. Aforementioned easy nerd icebreaker. Lots of jokes about crappy magical means of transportation that are still more effective than the L train. Then we move into other media… some criticism of a theater show you saw and then Silicon Valley ’cause you’re in tech. I ask if it’s realistic. You say it’s a documentary. I complain about the horrid representation of women. You drop a paragraph charting the lack of women throughout Mike Judge’s work, and I drop my number. Remember, this was still a while back. I was dropping my number like a hot potato.

I get a text from you asking if I’d like to get a drink and discuss the lack of women in TV. I say I’d love nothing more.

Yes, goddamnit, yes. We finished the banter on the app, and we move straight to setting up a meeting. Very impressive, Boy 6.

What’s interesting about this is that our texting wasn’t super sparky. There has been a general trend of banter and joking via text that is almost interchangeable at this point between Boys 1, 3 and 5 (with whom I am not actively scheduling second dates).

Our texting is more practical and simple, and once we moved off Hinge, the only texting was to coordinate logistics. Boy 4 is an anomaly (because I kind of already want to embroider his name on my pillow)… we hit on instantly engaging topics via text, and we met almost right away.

Day of our date you text to check in. We change locations because I’m coming from somewhere else now to a bar you love in the West Village. It’s an unmarked speakeasy style bar with those square hunks of ice in the drinks that are so awesome. And an hour into our date a jazz band appears.

You’re there already with drink in hand.

You look like your picture. You are your height. You’ve got kind of hipster glasses. You have broad shoulders. I am intrigued.

I go get my drink. Thank you for not insisting on paying for mine. Yours is some kind of thing with an orange peel in it, and I get a vodka seltzer with a beautiful floating ice cube and a funny metal straw. I love this place, Boy 6, and I actually secretly kind of hate bars.

The conversation is all right at first. Questions about profession… we sort of have to get into some of this more expository stuff because we didn’t text much. You tell me about tech and the lack of women. We get into people who write about science and don’t know shit about science. I tell you my computer science story.

Basically, I took one computer science class, and I ended up having to drop it, but I was completing an assignment that I kept messing up. And I kept thinking, “ugh it’s the computer.” And then I realized… girl, it’s literally NEVER the computer. The computer is simply a reflection of what you put into it. It’s always you. It’s never the computer. You liked this.

The band arrives and we move to bar stools. You are facing me with your legs open. I have learned from a male friend that this means you are body-language-ing me. Ah, ok. So if you open your knees towards me and/or put your feet on my stool, that’s a sign… maybe. This is confusing.

And then we start talking books. You are well read. You are reading one chapter of War and Peace every day. You mock me for liking Jonathan Franzen ’cause you couldn’t get past the bit in The Corrections when the pasty intellectual white professor sleeps with his student. I see you, Boy 6. We talk podcasts. You recommend one called “Deli Boys,” and I explain that I have trouble at Jewish delis because I don’t like anything smoked. You’re horrified. It’s cute. What can I say? Personalities get me all hot and bothered. We talk brisket which you claim as a Southern thing and I claim as a Jewish thing. We walk to the subway, and you miss your stop while you show me all the podcasts on your phone. I explain that I detest soundscapes behind human voices.

You say this was fun. Let’s do it again.

Boy 6, you left me wanting more. I am curious. I would go on another date with you. I would definitely sleep with you.

I want to thank you:

  1. So far, you and Boy 2 are minimal texters pre-first-date. That is downright awesome.
  2. You read. You read so much. You and Boy 4. There’s this thing that happens, I guess, when you are both readers where suddenly, even though you’re strangers, you know the same people. We can gossip about these people. Love them, hate them, lust after them, dismiss them, etc. And then I can tell you to meet other people… Pierre Bezukhov and Neil Klugman and Pip Tyler. And because it’s not as literal as television, which I also love, we can wade through our interpretations and know each other a little.
  3. You seem particular but peaceful.
  4. You have an adorable dog.

UPDATE: You text me the next day. Asking me how I’m doing, etc. We’re texting now about Beowulf and Nathan For You. No date set up, but horizon.