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Now, one of the reasons my Dad makes such a great roommate while I'm bouncing back from a breakup is that we have roughly equivalent social needs. We'll exchange a couple words in passing when we happen to be home at the same time, but we won't spend large amounts of time in the same room or get all up in each other's business when the other obviously needs space. It's an easy, low-key way to fulfill that need for social interaction.
But my Dad also has a new girlfriend that he's been seeing for a few months, and he spent the last couple nights over at her place. (Which is one reason I'm considering accelerating my plans to move out of his place as soon as we're past the holidays: it's working out great for me, but I know he'd rather be having her over to his place than going to hers, and she feels awkward staying over when I'm around.) So I had this great date on Tuesday, and I kind of coasted off of that on Wednesday, and by Thursday I was feeling kind of blah, and today I've been feeling kind of lousy. And I realize it's because my Dad hasn't been around and after work I come home to an empty house and work on freelancing stuff, and I'm lonely.
Now, I could easily get Ms. Info to fulfill this need for me. On Wednesday when I texted back and forth with her to set up the second date, she always answered me immediately and we were at the golden ratio of 3:2 texts from her vs. texts from me. I could easily have texted her a couple more times and gotten more of a "hit" of socialization, and she hinted that she wanted to see me again as soon as possible, so I could have blown off my freelance stuff and set up a second date for Thursday or Friday easy.
But then I'd just be recreating the same thing that happened with Ms. Plato. I'd be signaling to her that I'm looking for her to be my girlfriend. So what I need to do is recognize that I have this social need and look for ways to fulfill it that don't rely on any one person, especially not a person that I'm dating. Even when I'm living with someone, getting the majority of my socialization needs met that way means I'm at the mercy of their moods. When they feel lousy, I feel lousy.
So today on my lunch break I made it a point not to spend the whole hour with my nose in a book or my headphones on, and instead I walked around downtown, started a couple of short, in-passing conversations with strangers, and gave a homeless guy the half of my salad that I didn't eat.
Tomorrow I'm going disc golfing with an old friend, and next week I'm meeting with a theater group to do live readings of A Christmas Story, so I should have no problem keeping my socialization tank full.
I'm not used to having to think about this stuff because I'm used to being somebody's boyfriend and getting that need met without thinking about it. That's my default. New plan: find a new default.
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
The latter was better. Don't shoot your eye out.
Hier stehe ich. Ich kann nicht Anders tun. Gott hilfe mir. Amen. - Martin Luther
In faith there is enough light for those who want to believe and enough shadows to blind those who don't. - Pascal
My journey
Online Dating:
Signed up for a Plenty of Fish profile for the first time; for some reason I never realized that they're actually usable as a free service. I had it in my head that they were primarily paid and their free version was totally hobbled, like Match.
Not impressed so far, though: I don't like the way the site is set up, and profiles all seem to be insanely short. There's "concise," and then there's "you didn't actually tell me !@#$ about yourself."
Also they've got this "Meet Me" function that seems to work like a cross between OKC's "Like" function / Match's "Wink" function and a Tinder swipe, and it seems kind of annoying and useless. I seem to get a couple "[username] would like to meet you!" messages every day, and a good 90% of them are "looking for a serious relationship" and have something in the text part of their profile about how they're "not interested in playing games," which is fine, except that I specifically list myself as only interested in casual dating / not looking for a relationship right now. Bitch all I do is play games! NEXT!
This must be how hot women with good pictures feel when guys send generic messages that make it obvious they didn't read their profile.
Shouldn't complain, though, got two dates set up for this week: a second date with Ms. Info, and a first with a cute natural(-looking) redhead from Match who has (gasp!) an actually well-written and unique profile, can hold a conversation over email at least, and sews her own dresses (and damn well if that's what she's wearing in her profile pics). Two dates in a week is pretty much the max my schedule can support anyway, and I'm sort of half-hoping my poker night tomorrow gets canceled so I can get some shit done.
Meanwhile, in real life...
My sister and I got to talking and somehow we got on the subject of one of my exes, the one I spent most of my twenties with (forum codename: "L"). I told her the story of stumbling onto L's OKC profile back when I was first getting back into the dating game after breaking up with her, and how I thought it was hilarious that her profile pic is of her all girlied up (as a bridesmaid in my sister's wedding, as it happens) in a way that she will NEVER do on a date.
I had forgotten that L and my sister were still Facebook friends when last I checked, and apparently they still are, because my sister got this weird look on her face while I told that story and finally blurted out, "okay, I'm sorry, I probably shouldn't tell you this but I just can't keep holding it in: her new boyfriend looks JUST like you! I mean, it's !@#$ing UNCANNY! I don't know whether that makes you feel good or bad or what the hell you make of it, but I've literally never met someone who looks as much like you as this dude."
I thought about it for a second and said, "it probably doesn't mean anything other than that she has a type, but I think somewhere inside I will probably always believe that it means she'll never get over me, and I'm not entirely proud of how good that feels."
My sister says, "Well, I guess that's a pretty mature way to look at it."
I roar with laughter. "No it's not!"
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
These women on PoF all seem to combine it with other factors, though, like being in the just-north-of-30 Biological Clock Danger Zone + wants kids (which means she really should be buckling down and looking for husband material, not getting short-term itches scratched) or including some line about "don't have time for drama" or "just looking for an honest guy" (which I read as "I'm a drama magnet and don't own up to my own part in attracting the wrong kind of guy for me").
If my prospects were to dry up I might give one or two of the more promising ones a shot anyway on the off chance I'm judging too harshly, but my dating schedule is exactly where I want it to be so I don't exactly have much incentive right now.
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
Or not...
Hier stehe ich. Ich kann nicht Anders tun. Gott hilfe mir. Amen. - Martin Luther
In faith there is enough light for those who want to believe and enough shadows to blind those who don't. - Pascal
My journey
I didn't realize that I'd been vague in my invitation until I texted her over lunch to remind her to dress warmly and wear comfortable shoes for the show; she's all, "Oh, you were inviting me to dinner AND to the show? Jeez, I thought we were just doing dinner and I was all disappointed that I only get to see you for an hour! I like this plan way better!"
Poor girl, she must have been so confused about why I was demoting her from a three-hour fancy cocktail date to a lame cheap one-hour dinner date!
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
They did.
Picked her up, dinner went well; local sandwich-and-salad place, quick and cheap but good, healthy food. Dressed warmly and casually for an evening outdoors, she looked more like my initial assessment of "cute-but-not-OMG-hot" like she looked in her flattering black party dress from the first date. I did tell her to dress warmly; at least I know she cleans up well.
We get to the show venue early and walk around and look at the Christmas lights and chat for a while. Then we get back and I put on the show with the rest of the Shakespeare group. It goes over well; I glance at her during pauses for signs that she's getting bored (it's a long reading; I had it in my head that it was a one-hour thing but it was closer to two) but she seems entertained.
We chat with the other readers for a bit after the show, then get back in the car where I kiss her. Probably should have just done that at the start of the date, because she says, "I've been waiting all week for that."
I drive her home, we make out some more. She says something like, "I feel like I'm too short to make out in the car." I tell her there's an easy solution to that: invite me inside. She does.
She asks me to put something on the TV while she takes care of her dog. She also conspicuously closes the door to her bedroom and says that it's embarrassingly messy. She's mentioned that she keeps wanting to try out Arrow, so I put that on Netflix. She sits down and we watch maybe thirty seconds before I say, "Well, that was silly, I put on something you actually want to watch when we know we're not going to be watching it."
She laughs, "Yeah, I was wondering why you did that." We start making out on the couch and the TV show is forgotten for the rest of the evening.
She is very responsive and I can gauge what's doing it for her by the sounds she makes. It's mostly the same stuff that does it for me: hair-pulling, hand-pinning, breast play. She says at one point, "kudos for having the balls to go straight for my breasts; most guys grab my ass first." I slap her ass and say, "your ass is great too." She smiles and says, "I know."
It's her breasts that are sensitive, though, so I get her topless (and she does the same to me) and we go at it some more. She stops me from taking off her pants, though. We make out for a while longer and every once in a while I come back to her pants, at one point slipping my hand down the front and rubbing her, which she responds to. "You're a terrible man."
I tell her I know. After some more of that, during a break for breath, I must get a look on my face because she asks, "What's that look?" I figure honesty is a virtue and do the deep-eye-contact thing and say, "I want to tear your pants off, carry you into your messy bedroom, throw you down on the bed, taste your pussy, and then fuck you." I laugh a little. "You know, that look."
She looks a little regretful. "I really want to let you, but I had a gyno appointment this morning and I'm feeling pretty tender."
We make out some more, then I tell her, "Well, I don't want to, but I've got to leave some time." She pouts, she doesn't want me to leave. I don't even get my shirt back on before she's convinced me to stay a while longer.
Long story short-- or, well, long story less long than I could make it if I let myself keep rambling-- I do eventually get her pants off and rub her pussy until she comes on my fingers. She says, "I want to make you come too" and starts giving me an HJ.
Here's the thing: I've never been very good at just relaxing and letting somebody else see to my pleasure. I like to be the one in the driver's seat to Pound Town. And after the first hour of foreplay, my junk tends to give up and decide that I'm not serious about getting off tonight. Hindsight being 20/20, I need to realize that I'm good with making out as a prelude to sex, or making out for its own sake for three hours straight, but not making out for three hours straight as a prelude to sex. In any case, it's just not happening tonight.
She asks if there's anything else she can do; I tell her that it feels very good and search for a way to say, "No, not really" in a nice way. She finishes the sentence, "but you kind of reached a plateau. That's fine."
We make out for a while longer and then kind of relax half-naked in each other's arms; it's very late by now and we almost doze. Finally I get up and put my clothes back on. She expresses regret that she was too sore from her gyno appointment to have sex; I tell her that we'll have plenty of chances. She seems to like this. We kiss goodnight and I leave.
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
I need to recognize that it's okay as a guy to want to go a little slower and get more comfortable instead of pushing for sex right away. I think I'm pressuring myself as much as her and I need to quit that and learn to just relax. Not easy to do when you haven't had a really good hard fuck in a while, but something I need to learn.
In any case, she's a sweet girl and I think I'll keep seeing her. Also got a first date coming up Thursday night, and a girl I knew in high school who seems keen to reconnect on Facebook, not sure if that's just friendly or the fact that my profile reads "single" now.
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
She seemed kind of surprised when I didn't try to go for a kiss or anything, really, at the end of the night. I dunno, I'd give her a second date if she wanted one just on the off chance, she was good company, just... in this weirdly platonic way.
Only thing I can point to that I definitely didn't like is that she didn't even pretend to offer to pay her part of the bill or pick up the tip. I tend to pick very cheap first dates specifically so that I can pay without hardship and it doesn't have to become a source of awkwardness, and this one was cheaper than most because she ordered a non-alcoholic drink (says she doesn't like the taste of alcohol). If I like a girl enough that I plan to see her again, I'll wave her offer away and tell her she can get the next one unless she absolutely insists. But it's still nice to get the offer, even if I can tell it's just politeness. It's just a couple bucks, but still.
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
As for the second girl, she certainly wasn't repulsive; by any objective standard she was very attractive. But there was just zero sexual vibe there. Most women, if they're even reasonably attractive, I'm imagining kissing them from pretty much Moment 1. This woman I didn't. I would've had to consciously force myself to go for the kiss. Maybe I should've anyway, it's not like I had much to lose, but the phrase "like trying to kiss my sister" comes to mind.
^ Maybe it's just the power of association, but so far, the women I've been most attracted to are the ones who have pushed the hardest to pay part. Typically if they offer once I'll tell them no, I've got it; if they keep pushing, I'll let them pick up the tip. And typically they'll also thank me, which this one didn't do. It IS a dance, but so is all politeness and courtesy. We do these little rituals because it displays social intelligence and enough respect for the other person to hold up our end of the social contract.
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
When I buy a car, I go to many car lots and drive cars to see which one I want, then pay for it. I have never given the salesman $50 for "looking" at what he is offering.
If you take a woman to a nice Italian restaurant and pay for everything, then you are the one that she will call next time she is craving Raviolis.
If you are looking for a one night stand, and you think you are going to get laid, by all means pay if you want, as long as you are 100% you are gonna get laid.
I'm going to catch flack for this post, lol, but oh well.
a) higher probability of him seeing himself as a gentleman -->
a1): wanting traditional gender roles in a relationship. A lot of the time, these guys are also the ones who are going to take charge more, because they have a clear idea of what kind of behavior they see as "manly" and want to adhere to that image (unlike a lot of guys who really have no idea).
a2): higher probability of him having a set of principles that he adheres to (of which "the man pays on a first date" is one), instead of having no idea what he sees as right or wrong.
b) higher probability of him not being a player or PUA.
c) higher probability of him wanting (and being able to) provide in part for a woman in his life. If he wants to provide, he probably also wants to protect, because those two things usually go together in most people's minds.
d) slightly higher probability of him wanting something long-term vs. just a one-night stand.
e) higher probability of him being a grown-up and having his life under control. I would have never assumed this is the case, but it's what I found out over time: most of the guys who pay for their dates are (mentally) more mature than those who don't.
I don't need or want free meals; what I want on a first date is to find out who I'm dealing with. Whether or not the guy wants to pay factors into my judgment.
You suggested that paying for her might be a good idea if you're going for a one night stand, but I actually think that that's the one situation in which it's actually a bad idea. Paying for her may lead her to assume that you have, and are offering to her, both alpha and beta qualities. If all you want is a ONS, you're not offering any of your beta qualities to her, and only a limited range of your alpha qualities (ETA: so paying might cause confusion over what you're looking for - which might help to get her into bed but also doesn't feel 100% honest).
Also, what @Ben said: "We do these little rituals because it displays social intelligence and enough respect for the other person to hold up our end of the social contract."
Maybe not, but I at least like the fact that I'm paying to be acknowledged. It doesn't even have to be an explicit offer to pitch in-- in fact, it probably shouldn't, if the offer isn't really sincere-- but a simple, "You go it? Thank you," when she sees me pull my wallet out is nice.
And the millennial version, from what I've seen, isn't "pretending" to go Dutch; they expect to actually go Dutch, and are honestly surprised that I offer to pay. Ms. Info offered to treat me when she asked for a venue change to someplace closer to where she lives, on the theory that since I was paying more in gas and travel time, it was only fair for her to pay more in cash.
Anyway, my general policy is that first dates are my treat, subsequent dates are Dutch unless I explicitly offer to treat in advance (which I'll do if I'm feeling particularly flush or generous, or if she seems particularly broke, like if I were to date a full-time student). With Ms. Info, I set that expectation early in the first date: as we sat down and were looking at drink menus, I told her, "first round's on me courtesy of my poker buddies; I won last night." The implication being that me treating is a special occasion; I'm willing to do it without making a big thing out of it, but don't expect it every time.
I think that was probably a good way to handle it, and I think I'll try to make a point of doing something that like in future so that the "man pays or Dutch" negotiation is up-front instead of an awkward surprise when the bill comes.
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
But I would never say that to a man who was paying the bill. I would thank him for dinner at the end of the date.
A couple of drinks, or an appetizer or meal on a first meet/date, and I'm pulling out my wallet fully intending to pay for my share. But your beer plus my soda? Not so much. Hell it could just be that she doesn't want to pay for half your drink when she had Coke. The no thank you is troublesome, much more than who paid.
Remember to play!
Do the right thing, whether anyone is watching or not.
Be married, until you are not.
Email address: angeline.greenwood@att.net
Well, I certainly wouldn't expect her to pay half of the total bill and subsidize my more expensive order.
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.