Adventures in dating (non-fiction)

            I hung up the phone and shook my head. She wants to meet at Applebee’s?

            In 1993, at the ripe old age of 35, I took stock of my life. I was doing pretty well, actually. I had my health, a good job, my own home. Most of the American dream.

            There was just one thing missing. I was still single, still alone. Most of my friends were married and starting to have kids, so I saw them less often because of their parenting duties. This meant that I was spending a lot of time alone.

            I felt like an outlier, a solo artist. Everywhere I went, I was surrounded by couples. I started feeling self-conscious about attending events by myself, or about tagging along as the “third wheel.” I was certainly used to going to movies and to dinner by myself, but that was starting to get old.

            I had dated sporadically, but never seriously. I seemed to specialize in meeting women who weren’t “looking for a serious relationship at this time.” I probably should have been more aggressive in my search for a mate, but that just wasn’t my style. I attribute this to a couple of things. First, the psychic damage inflicted on me by going to an all-boys high school. Those crucial teen years are when I should have been meeting and getting to know members of the opposite sex. Instead, I was surrounded by guys who were just as confused and filled with hormonal angst as I was.

            The second thing was my overwhelming shyness/fear of rejection/lack of self-confidence. It might be an older sibling thing. My younger brother can talk to anyone in any social situation without breaking a sweat. I sometimes wonder if we’re really related.

            So, in 1993, having reached a “mature” age, I was determined to find a partner. I didn’t know what it would lead to, if anything, but I was going to try to meet someone.

            I analyzed the situation, trying to determine what I had done wrong in the past and how I could achieve success going forward. I started by taking personal inventory: I wasn’t George Clooney, but neither did I frighten small children who saw me. I was somewhere in between.

            Given my shyness, I knew I needed some assistance in my search, so I decided to employ the services of the media.

            Because this was the era before the Internet took over and destroyed our lives, the media in question was the print media. Our daily newspaper, the Plain Dealer, and the alternative weekly, the Free Times, used to run personal ads in their back pages. At the time, there was still some embarrassment attached to answering a personal ad. However, I chose to look at this as a sociological experiment and plunged ahead.

            Today, we’re used to online dating services like match.com, where you scan rows and rows of potential mates with the push of a few buttons on a smart phone. However, in those pre-historic days of the early 90s, the personal ad waters had to be negotiated without knowing what the other person looked like. There were no photos in the ads. There was a six- or seven-line description of the person, his or her likes and dislikes, and the qualities he or she sought in a partner. 

            In order to contact someone whose ad appealed to you, you called a 900 number, punched in the code assigned to the ad, and listened to their message. After the beep, you could leave your own message, and then hope to hear back. At the time, “Seinfeld” was the most popular show on television, and this whole endeavor seemed like a plot from that show–with me as George Costanza, of course.

            I approached this quest with due diligence. I spent weeks scouring ads of potential dates, all the while reminding myself that I was on a mission and encouraging myself to keep at it. I focused on women with whom I seemed to have mutual interests, which I hoped would propel us past the awkwardness of the situation.

            I finally found an ad in the Free Times that seemed to meet my criteria. We had similar interests—the arts, movies, raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens, bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens. She seemed like a likely candidate, so I screwed up my courage, dialed the number, and listened to her message.

            Her name was Laurie, and she sounded very nice. In her message, she said she was looking to meet someone fun and interesting, and then see where that led. She had a pleasant voice, she seemed quite charming—I was sold.

            It cost $1.99 a minute to call the 900 number, and the meter was ticking, so after listening to her message and hearing the beep, I sprang into action: “Hi,LauriethisisAlexandyouradcaughtmyeyeIthinkwehavelotincommonandI’dlovetohearbackfromyou.”

            I went into a brief description of what I thought were my positive qualities, including being fun and interesting, and left my phone number. I hung up, feeling exhilarated. The experiment had begun.

            A few days later, having almost forgotten that I had contacted this woman, I got a call from her. After my initial surprise, we had a relatively pleasant conversation, covering the basics like what we did for a living, and what side of town we each lived on (the eternal question in Cleveland). Like me, she lived on the east side, which seemed like a good start.

            The whole time we were talking, though, I was picking up on a weird vibe, like she had merely called me out of curiosity, just to see if someone who sounded so nice and intelligent actually existed. Maybe she was coming off a bad relationship.

            I had already stuck my toe in the water by calling her in the first place, so I stuck my whole foot in and asked if she wanted to meet, but she declined my invitation. Okay, no problem, I said, thanks for calling. We ended the conversation, and that was that.

            Or so I thought. I must have made some kind of impression on her, because she called me the next night and said that she did want to get together, after all. Cool, I said, and we agreed to meet at a local Applebee’s—Applebee’s—the next night. We described ourselves so that we would recognize each other. Her: petite, short brown hair. Me: well, you know…

          The next day, I was so excited and nervous that I was pretty useless at work. This was going to be my first experience actually meeting someone through a personal ad, and I had no idea what to expect. How would the conversation go? How awkward would it be?

            I was also curious to know what had made her change her mind about getting together. And, I was feeling a little full of myself—obviously, my boyish charm had created an overwhelming desire in her to meet me.

            That night, I arrived at the restaurant a little before the appointed hour, wearing my best suit, every hair in place. I stood nervously in the entrance, scanning every woman who might be Laurie, and going over my list of what we could talk about: art, movies, the fall of the Berlin Wall. You know, typical first date conversation.

          Finally, after about 10 minutes, a woman fitting Laurie’s description walked into the restaurant. Petite, short brown hair—it had to be her. I straightened up and put on my best “nice to meet you” face.

            She approached me. “Are you Alex?” she said.

            I nodded. “Laurie? Nice to meet you.” I smiled and extended my right hand.

            She shook it and withdrew her hand. Then, she slowly gave me the once-over, top to bottom, kind of like the Terminator.

            Finally she spoke again. “You know what?” she said. “I don’t want to get together after all.”

            Oh.

            I wish there had been a camera there to capture the look on my face at that moment. In my mind, I heard a soft ssssssssssssssssss—the sound of my ego deflating. My eyes narrowed and I was silent a moment, then I discovered my voice and mumbled something along the lines of “okay, no problem.”

            Laurie turned and walked out of the restaurant. To preserve the tiny scrap of my dignity that remained, I waited until she got into her car before I walked out to the parking lot.

            Who knows? Maybe she’d had a bad day. Maybe her goldfish was sick. To this day, I still wonder why she went to all the trouble of leaving her home and driving to Applebee’s to meet me, if she was prepared to dismiss me so quickly. I also wonder how many times she pulled this stunt, or if any guy ever passed her inspection.

            If she’s still looking for someone, then the smart phone and online dating must have made her life much easier. Now she can save time AND gas by rejecting guys from the comfort of her couch. That would also spare other guys from what happened to me that night.

            I’ve had other personal ad dates since then, but for some reason, this one really sticks out. So I guess I’m grateful to Laurie for giving me a story to tell all these years later. It’s actually my second best story, right after the one about how the cleaning service maid stole a Boston crème pie out of my freezer, and how I learned its eventual fate. But that’s a story for another day.