Does a video date count? I think in this era it counts.
Big in Japan is stuck in the faraway place because some asshole in Virginia won’t get a shot. Okay, that’s hyperbolic but it’s also kind of true. Maybe I’ll meet him, maybe I won’t. Who knows. I went back to the drawing board.
It was a bad week. Two guys straight-up insulted me.
One guy told me my opening line was terrible, no wonder I’m single, it’s just my personality, I probably can’t help it. What did I say to invite this onslaught? I said “I’m watching the wind knock the trees around, it’s a stormy afternoon. What are you doing?”
Another guy called me a racist Trumpster. In this case, I made the mistake of asking about his tattoos, of which there were many on display, and his government day job, was there no conflict? “A black man can’t have tattoos and a corporate job? You know nothing about corporate America, you need to educate yourself.” I’m an idiot about a lot of things, but corporate American is *not* one of them, and the government does not equal corporate America.
There are a million things I don’t know about being black. I apologized.
That’s when he called me a racist Trumpster. I asked a friend for perspective. My friend is brown and has ink in his home country’s language.
“There’s a stretch he could be making about incarceration and tattoos, but you were just asking about dress code. People ask about my ink all the time and I just tell them, they’re about my family. I don’t assume they’re asking me if I’m Yakuza. Also, why go out of your way to insult someone when you can just unmatch them? I can see the chip on his shoulder from here.”
Live and learn. Also, no.
I didn’t want to do the video date thing. I spend enough time on Zoom and Google Meet and such, but what the hell. “I just like to see if we can, you know, have a conversation while we’re trying to get schedules to synch up,” he said.
He’s originally from Atlanta, he’s got the drawl. He’s got a fancy job and a graduate degree from Morehouse. He’s been here for six months. When his Oregon tech giant office went remote, he moved. He’s got a small dog. “She takes up all my personal space,” he said.
We talked for an hour and a half. It was a nice, easy conversation. I couldn’t tell if there was chemistry, but it was fun to talk to him. He made me laugh more than once. He asked to meet in person.
I texted him after we were done talking. “That was fun. I’ll check my calendar and we’ll make a plan.”
“I like your energy,” he said. “You made me look up a word.”
“I didn’t think that was a test, but maybe it was? I appreciate you making the effort.”
Remember this guy? Short recap: He was late and in an effort to impress me with his adventure cred, told me about the time he got robbed in a NOLA crack den. I was not impressed.
He matched me again.
Two possibilities.
I left so little impression on him that he does not remember me. This is an insult of a less direct variety, but to be so forgettable is painful.
Or, as my bestie suggested, “He remembers you, he hopes you don’t remember him.”
There’s a third, I suppose. He doesn’t think he blew it.
This whole experience is so fucking weird.