I am nearing the end of my twenties, and throughout this partial decade I have been on four first dates, that stayed as first dates. Here for you all is a transcript of my miserable track record.
Contestant Number 1:
In my very early twenties I was convinced by some excellent friends to download Tinder as a way to potentially meet people, and (I won't lie) a confidence booster. Started chatting, as you do, and secured an invite to brunch. It was a lovely little café in Guelph, and I will say they had excellent crèpes, and the date seemed to be going well, until the following little red flag creeped up. He told me that he'd had a few girlfriends in the past and that if this date didn't end in marriage he was giving up. But I thought, hey, he's honest.
We left the restaurant, he paid, which was very nice and he definitely didn't need to (men don't have to pick up the tab you know). He proceeded to awkwardly grab my hand as we walked back to his apartment where I parked my car and asked if I wanted to come back to his place and watch Friends on Netflix. While I was naive, I did know what Netflix and chill was, but he didn't actually say Netflix and chill, so I thought, hey, why not. I like Friends. I went up to his apartment and let's just say I was not prepared for the octopus hands nor the very damp first kiss. I hightailed it out of there and spent the thirty minute ride home chewing copious amounts of gum and wiping saliva off my face. But, I thought, one bad apple doesn't rot the bushel.
Contestant Number 2:
Back to the Tinder grind. Second locale was some hipster coffee shop, who's name was something like Dead Rabbit or Death Bunny. In all honesty though, the place wasn't horrible. My date was already there when I arrived and he proceeded to boast of his IQ, that he was developing an app, but if that didn't pan out, he'd be an engineer. We started chatting about relationships, where red flag after red flag cropped up. Red flag numero uno, his last relationship ended because his last girlfriend lied and said he was verbally abusive... Okay not good. Red flag number two was that he didn't believe in love or marriage because apparently our cells die and regenerate every seven years so technically, we aren't the same person in seven years so you can't possibly love someone longer than that. I should've left after that, but I waited for red flag number 3, where after I tried to argue that love exists because my parents are still together after 20+ years and they still love each other, he stated and I quote, "you're mother must have Stockholm syndrome then." I noped outta there so fast and never heard from him again.
Queue the five year hiatus before:
Contestant Number 3:
I'm now twenty seven and am bombarded by ads for Hinge. Created a profile and found a cute geeky guy who shared similar interests as me. Had a few Minecraft dates before we agreed to meet at a boardgame café. And I will say that this date turned bad not through any fault of his. This one was on me.
Our conversation was good, a bit awkward, but I didn't mind. We played a few games and then decided to end the date. He walked me to my car where I proceeded to roll my ankle, tried to recover, wobbled and landed on all fours like I had been shot. He asked if I was ok but I brushed him off, told him I was clumsy and dove for my car door. Once inside, I took stock of the damage, pulled a stone out of my leg and drove off. Pulled out of the parking lot and kept having to swat my leg as a fly had gotten in and kept landing on me, but I turned the music up and drove for home. As soon as I was on the road, my car made a consistent noise through the speakers that can only be described as a grinding honking sound, so I tried Bluetooth instead of the radio. No dice. Same obnoxious noise. Okay music off. The fly landed on me again so I looked down at a red light and realized that it was not, in fact, a fly, but blood running down my leg from where the stupid rock had been imbedded in my knee. I searched my car for tissues and only found old receipts, but I thought it had to be better than nothing. But no. It just smeared the blood around and did nothing to stem the flow rolling down my leg onto the floor of my car. Ten minutes later and the bleeding hadn't stopped, but I did find out that the obnoxious noise also came through my speakers every time I used my blinkers to signal. I'm ten minutes from home so figured I'd use hands free and try to call my sister to see if she could prep some first aid stuff for when I got home. She didn't answer (which Imma call her out for cause I was on a first date and could've died, but whatever) so I left a message.
Finally, I pulled into my parking spot, turned off my car and waddled and limped my way to our condo unit.
Turns out my sister got my call but all she heard was an obnoxious, garbled mess because my car messed with the handsfree calling on my phone. And, because we had just moved back home after some renovations, we didn't have any first aid so I patched myself up with leftover napkins from takeout the night before and secured it with strips of duct tape.
The next day, he texts me saying he doesn't see it going anywhere and essentially to have a nice life. This was a-okay by me as obviously the bad luck gods didn't deem us a good fit.
Which brings us to today.
Contestant Number 4:
We decided to meet at Timmies, and he mentioned a nearby trail in Waterloo. So I thought, okay, I'll grab a water from Tim's, we'll walk for a bit and probably sit and chat. I get there and he asks what I want. I tell him I just want water and lo and behold he's already brought water for our walk and it's in his car. So I ask where the trail is and he says it's five minutes away by driving. We hop in his car and drive down a side street to a trail marker.
We get out to the 30°c feels like 40°c weather and start to walk. Twenty minutes later, I am soaked and can feel my pasty skin starting to burn, which to be honest doesn't take much. We sit on a bench, where I proceed to not only have swamp butt, but feel like I have just stepped out of the shower. He puts his arm around my shoulders and scoots closer where we proceed to have a stilted awkward convo to try and get to know each, while I am sporting a stunning sweat stache and trying not to be obvious about it while his face is inches from mine.
I turn my head to try and staunch the sweaty mess above my upper lip and catch the drops running down from my temples when he tries to grab my face and go in for the kiss. Nope, nope, nope. The last time someone tried that it was gross, and this was about to be moist in a whole other way, so I push him back, get up and suggest we continue walking. But, stupid me, picked the direction opposite where the car is parked. Thirty minutes later and we're off the trail and in downtown Waterloo. My water is gone, the sun is back, the breeze is dead and my hands are starting to shake and I feel a bit weak. But we're still thirty minutes away from my little car (which is fine by the way and no longer makes obnoxious noises) and salvation, when I spot another Tim's and suggest stopping as I'm not feeling too good. He gets me an ice water while I make a stop at the restroom on wobbly legs. I'm thinking I'll splash some water on my face, pat myself dry with some paper towels, when I get a feeling in my stomach and lurch towards the toilet. I proceed to lose my lunch and all the water I've ingested in the last hour. I turn to the sink and see my sweaty face has turned tomato-like. Great.
I drink my water and we continue on. For another fifteen minutes I drag my feet until I get to the Starbucks on the corner. I feel like I'm on the verge of passing out, mumble some excuse to him about my sister being in town and that she wants to meet me here, and leave him on the corner after a very damp hug. I make my escape to the Starbucks where I call my sister and ask her to drive the twenty minutes to where I am so she can drive me five minutes down the road to pick up my car.
I grab a drink (pineapple refresher lemonade, so good, #starbucksplug) and make my way to the only available seat, which happens to be back outside on the patio. I stumble and try to pull out the chair but it falls over. I almost tumble into the bushes trying to right it and wait for my saviour to come.
So now I sit, in my lovely air conditioned living room, with my water bottle and a pounding headache. My sister has been given control of my love life, a la Rachel and Monica, and I'm seriously thinking I may have to Weird Science a guy into my life. Or just adopt some more cats - decision is still up in the air.
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