disclosure

My first blind date was with a man who recently moved here from Brooklyn, New York  (no accent though).  He's originally from Boston (still no accent).  I met him on OKCupid a free online dating website.  I have set my online search preferences to show me only men who have a PhD, or are in the process of obtaining one.  So "date#1" is working up at the university doing  research having to do with bio-technical stuff.  Smarty pants men really do it for me. And to clarify, by smart I mean educated.  As of late I have realized that "smart potential" is not enough.  I value education deeply, and I am starting to see the benefit of being more specific about what I really want when putting it out into the universe.  To be honest I like the idea of them teaching me a thing or two.  One of the first things we discussed by email was the culture shock he was experiencing.  I started to realize how fully saturated in Santa Cruz culture I am.   I couldn't adequately justify why people from the "valley"(San Jose) are poo-pooed by Santa Cruz locals.  I can't really explain localism, but I get it.  I can't explain why I love walking downtown; being surrounded by zany artists and crazy waco-a-doos, who may have over shot the mark tripping on psychedelics.  I can’t explain why all of this makes me feel all snug and cozy inside.  I like the feeling of not sticking out.  Being that I am the black sheep of my family, I love how this city is very accepting of the bold, brazen and those who are a little mentally unstable.  Anyway the "do's and don'ts" of Santa Cruz seemed to be lost on him.  We talked on the phone for an hour previous to our date the following night.  I was getting the impression that he may have been a little to uptight for my taste, and he was a little older than my age preference, but like I told him, even I'm a little older than I would like to be these days, so I guess I can be a little flexible on that one.  So we made plans to meet at an indian restaurant 7:00,  then 7:30, then 7:45.  Seems he was having a bit of time management issues straight out the gate.  

I arrived at 7:44 thinking, “perfect”, expecting to see him.  At 7:55 when I was waiting for him out in the cold and had received neither a text nor a phone call, I was beginning to get a bit perturbed. I decided not to go into the restaurant and wait because I have seen one to many scenes on t.v. where the girl gets stood up at the restaurant, and I was not about to be that girl.  As I vacillated in and out of the Goodwill Thrift store, next door trying to stay warm and kill time, I wondered what would I do if he didn’t show up?  How long am I supposed to wait?  Just as I was about ready to call it quits he called saying that his gauge of time was all wrong and he had parked on the wrong end of town, but he was walking in my direction.  So there he was; black suit jacket, jeans, black leather shoes and headed straight for me.  He looked exactly like his picture.  We walked back to the restaurant and sat down.  As I took off my jacket I saw his eyeballs scan me like a xerox machine.  But I could tell he wasn't conscious of what his brain was just naturally telling him to do.  I could also see him eyeballing my tattoos but similarly to what happened with my body, he quickly pretended like they weren't there.  Now what I'm about to say may sound a bit, well.. contradictory but I have a few things I am going to keep secret on FIRST dates:

1) I will not tell them I used to be a stripper. 

2) I will not tell them I have been with women most of my adult life. 

3) I will not tell them I am a mom.

I know what your thinking (and I cant help but agree with you a little), if I'm so concerned with my privacy, why am I willing to write my deepest inner thoughts and have them exposed on the internet?  Well, its my art.  There is a certain amount of anonymity when blogging and I will not be actively building a romantic relationship with the people reading this. 

So anyway, that being said, one of the things that I am working on is cultivating new relationships and building them slowly on solid emotional ground.  So when things get shaky the triggers are less likely, to be that of the “hair” variety (i.e hair trigger).  I will tell you the truth.  I have done some things in my life that many find shocking, entertaining, tragic, exciting and exploitive.  I have told people these stories nonchalantly and although I do enjoy the attention, I end up feeling overexposed.  I have found that once a man knows I used to be a stripper I can kiss the possibility of them ever really seeing me for who I am now goodbye.  The questions of what, when, where, and how start pouring out of their mouths like an overflowing bathtub and I can’t help but answer them.  Then I end up feeling like a Sunday newspaper at the breakfast cafe, on a Monday morning.  I feel tattered, disposable and my insides feel like crinkled up pieces of yesterday’s news.  I have spent my lifetime trying to be understood.  I have over identified with my own story and what I have done.  For years I have been convinced that I was my past.  Which by the way, I am not.  I have come up with an acronym for what I like to call our CRAP.  "Conditioned Responses Acquired for Protection".  There is a certain amount of CRAP that is inevitable as we wade through life on our way to getting more closely acquainted with our true essence.   

Once date#1 and I sat down, he and I small talked about bikes and such and pretty soon, he was telling me about things that I was not particularly interested in on a first date.  Things like A.A, death and dying, addiction and family issues.  On a couple of occasions I had to simply state I wasn't comfortable talking about that yet.  I did not reveal anything too personal and kept my boundaries and still oddly enough the date was turning into a little bit of a therapy session (me being the therapist).  Now don't get me wrong.  There was nothing bad about where this conversation was going..its just that I am now living in the present.  I have many things to talk about that don't include my painful and dysfunctional past.  I'm not saying I will never talk about it, or that I think it doesn't influence the way I am now, but I want there to be more of a foundation of trust before I go exposing all my inner demons.  Actually part of the reason I think that I make exceptions for this in my writing is because, I am able to build up to and explain some of those less than perfect parts of me.  They are stated within context and are less likely to be misunderstood, or misread.  We left the restaurant  and I was still relatively indifferent about how I felt about him.  I was open to seeing what would unfolded so we went and had coffee.  At around 10:00 I stared to get weary eyed, I agreed to have him drive me home.  As we approached my building he whipped out a pack of gum....asking if I would like some.  I declined.  In my mind I had this visualization of him wearing one of those seventies jogging suits, a head band and doing calisthenics warming up for the big event.  I could tell I was beginning to make that face.  The one where I clench my teeth,  squint my eyes and brace myself for what is about to be a very awkward moment. He parked the car.  Here is how I wish the story ended.  I say “thank you I had a nice time” and swiftly step out of the car and make my way up to my apartment, feeling confident that it wasn't a match, but I had fun.  Unfortunately, that is not what happened, and I take full responsibly for the nauseating events that followed.  

Codependence is something that I struggle with in my romantic relationships.  Ever heard of the phrase “people-pleasing”?, well I have an issue with “man-pleasing”, and its not as fun as it sounds.  Somewhere along the line I developed difficulty setting boundaries when it comes to mens affections toward me.  I have come along way, and yet I still feel the need to coddle them if I reject their advances.  So here’s what really happened.  Car stops.  He asks if I had fun, I say, “yeah”.  He asks if I would like to go out again, I say “yeah probably”.  I sensed his disappointment, with my use of the word probably.  Mostly because he blurted out, “probably?!”  And there I was deer in the head lights, frozen to make any adult-like logical and sound response.  I froze.  Then I tried to explain, then I tried to defend that I had just met him.  Then probably confused by the fact that I was still in his car and not being tuned in too well to reality himself, he reached over to kiss me.  I was able to defend my position and say I’m not ready for that but then I still COULDN'T GET OUT OF THE CAR.  Not because I was being held hostage, but because I felt it was my responsibility to either wait there until I did feel like kissing him, (which would have meant we would die in that car) or I was at least supposed to somehow stroke his ego so that he wouldn't be hurt by my saying no, and not being especially thrilled about the prospect of a second date.  I was in a sheer fuge state clamoring for something to say.  So what I said made things worse.  “You see,” I said, “I used to be a lesbian....so I’m just new to this whole guy thing again” (ACK broke rule #2)  This seemed to agitate him even more and began pointing out how I had just dropped a huge verbal bomb on him.  My head was spinning. All I could see was the dashboard of the car wondering how the hell I would ever get my legs to move, when all of a sudden he got out of the car, which then made it possible for me to get out and we performed an obligatory hug, and I went up stairs wondering what the hell just happened.  Clearly if I was going to continue going out with strangers I would have to come up with some better exit strategies.