christmas lights

So there we were. Walking down the street in a small town as the sky was turning dark. We were walking towards the car to drive an hour back to the city after a random day escapade in the hunt for a famous pie and local beer. So many thoughts rushing through my head after experiencing a somewhat romantic moment when the least thing I expected was a romantic moment. No matter how you put it, Christmas lights trail is either for families or cutesy couples.

I was thinking of all the time we had spent together a few times a week for the last couple of months. It hit me... he likes me. I don't think I'm ready for that. I randomly cut him off, a la Mean Girls, the word vomit came out. "Hey we're just friends, OK?!". He was not expecting that. Just responded "OK" and continued the conversation we were having. I felt so much better, like a weight off my shoulder.... only for about a week or two, because the weight came back. I was carrying a fucking loveseat sofa when he told over happy hour that he had a date. I felt like my drink came out of my mouth, along with a dragon worthy mile long fire. I started questioning him out of jealousy. Who is she? What's her name? Where did you meet? Have you been hanging out with her for a while? When? I thought we hung out almost all the time? How come you never told me? I feel weird for all these questions, I'm sorry.....After all, he told me, I had made it clear we were only friends. Well, fuck. "Fine, I like you, damnit!", I said... probably the same wording. He simply smiled. So did the bartender.

And then, we hit our local Christmas trail of lights. No pie.

The secret is out, like the jealous woman in me I did not know existed until I heard of another woman in the mix. Why isn't he holding my hand? I just told him I liked him. He likes me... then what the hell? Why wait? Families and couples only at trail of lights, remember? "You said we were just going to be friends", he reminded me. I'm pretty sure I stuttered like a little girl choosing plain vanilla ice cream and then seeing somebody else get the last bit of sprinkles on their ice cream after me. Damnit, I want those sprinkles! They could've been mine if I asked for them first! Now what the hell do I do? I demand those sprinkles, I lick them to claim them as mine like a little girl.

The moment I said it out loud, I just knew.

We've been dating for months now.

Doesn't mean I'll stop sharing disaster stories though.... like when he showed up an hour late to our first official date, and I thought to myself that would never happen to Reese Witherspoon.

The pissy beer thief

This guy and I have history that started in 2002. Timing has never been right. I was younger, he was into other things. I moved away, or he moved away. I dated, he dated. He got married. He is in the process of getting divorced. I am single. He thinks it's our chance, now that we are both in the same town.

We don’t hang out as much. Let’s say the tension has always been there and it has always been awkward. I understand why his wife hated me since before they got married. Last time we saw each other months ago we ended up almost screaming at each other over his Peter Pan Syndrome he never found a cure for, and over how high maintenance I am when I tell him to be responsible with his job and to not ask me for money when he purchased a house where until recently lived with his now ex-wife.

I have a bad habit of forgiving people. And one day, he swung by my apartment to hang out, watch TV, and have some beers to catch up and tell me about his divorce.Although I knew at some point he’d want to make a move. I lied about being in my period and not brushing my teeth for days, and coughed and sneezed a lot. Anything to keep him at bay. I purposely did not wear makeup and stayed in my scrubs. It didn't matter. Compliments were flying out of his mouth like exorcist projectile vomit. He started asking for a chance after all these years, how he was going to take me on a daytrip, how we are going to have wine and steak, how we are so good together---you name it. If it was 2002, I’d sigh and say yes. But something I have mastered with him is my judgmental look. Yeah right. This is not a romantic comedy that 12 years later things work out. It’s just not.

Then things got interesting. 

After arguing over random shit and poking fun at each other, the beer in my bladder demanded an escape. “Get me another beer, I’m going to pee.” As I’m walking to the bathroom, he calls me out from the kitchen. When I turned around, there he was… almost recreating a Karate Kid pose as he let out a fart. Yes, a fart. And then a laugh. WTF. I call him disgusting names as I go in to take care of my business. As I come back out to the kitchen to see him wiping the floor I remind him how fucking disgusting he is. After 12 years, it seems like a good time to fart for the first time. “Oh come on! I’ve known you for forever! We’re cool! Don’t act like you don’t do it!” I suddenly thought of my sisters and the gross things I’ve done. That’s different. My farts are cute. Trying to block that out of my head and let it go, it’s just a fart, I grab the beer on the counter. The warmer than usual beer. “Why is the beer warm?” I asked him. “Oh, I pissed in the empty beer bottles.” I put it back on the counter. Two warm beers. And  my words came out as loud and mad as a Kraken. His excuse: His bladder would explode and pieces of dismembered body would be splattered on my apartment walls if he waited 2 minutes while I used the restroom. I had seen him wiping the floor, right? He laughed. This is top notch comedy to him. Somebody please give him an HBO comedy special. “You just killed all of your chances to make it work between us.” With that piss history, he’d probably pull an R. Kelly on me. I don’t want to risk that chance. “Get the fuck out. And take your bottles of piss with you.” As As he finally left, I saw him walk away with one of my bottles of beer in his pocket. New. My favorite beer. “Hey WTF do you think you’re doing? You fart in front of me, piss in my kitchen, AND you take a new beer with you without even asking me if it’s OK?” He puts the piss bottles down. “Calm down, I’ll pay you back”, he says. “When the fuck do you plan to? You came in here, and drank 3 of my –craft- beers, and want to take a 4^th one. You have never in these 12 years even bought me dinner, or beer, or anything.” I can afford a six-pack, but this was over the top. “Give me back that fucking beer or I’ll spill your piss on your face” I said as I bent down to pick up his piss bottle. He gave it back, muttered some words I didn’t give a shit about hearing, and left with his 2 pee bottles

I still can't believe that happened. Sometimes I laugh at how ridiculous my dating life is and how ridiculous some of these men I know are. My inner laugh is louder than the fake laughing crowd that plays during The Big Bang Theory. That tells you something. I also can't believe how big his bladder is. Two bottles? I can't even do half a cup when I'm asked to do it at the doctors.

the 12 year old kiss and other bad dates

So... I gave online dating another chance. After all, it has worked before. I must have gone on over 10 first dates in the last few months. Maybe too many for what I was used to. It gave me a headache sometimes to schedule these. I followed a friend's advice this time. I was advised to go out with the (1) guy who I would not normally look at more than once but showed interest in me and deserved a chance, (2) the average looking guy who I have a lot in common with and has a decent potential, and with (3) the hot guy who I think would normally think is out of my league. Although there are many stories worth sharing that happened during this online-dating period, some more ridiculous than the ones I will share on this post... I will only talk about these three.

1. I was cold with this one. He seemed very "blah" and a little too enthusiastic to know all about me. "How is your day? What are you doing? How is work? How was your weekend? Really? Why? Tell me more." The more annoyed I got by his enthusiasm, the more I saw myself in him. Oh my God... I can be just as annoying as him when I like someone. Let me give him a chance. After all, he won't shut up about it. I had the opportunity and I called the shots. "We are meeting at -this craft beer place- with a food truck outside so we can have dinner too." I see him walking in. First impression: I thought you were trying hard to impress me and convince me to go out with you. Why are you wearing long baggy shorts, with flip flops, a polo shirt, and a baseball hat? I was immediately turned off by having visual access to his toe hairs on the first date. I also wondered what was underneath that baseball hat. Oh my God, he probably has a bald spot. Should I tell him that these baggy shorts and oversized polo shirt makes it look like he's just a torso with feet and hands? I realized I was being a total bitch focusing on things that didn't matter. After all, I did brush my hair, put make up and perfume on, and wore my best booty jeans to impress. I caught him looking. Just like I also caught him playing dumb when ordering drinks. After what seemed like 10 minutes, I made up my mind about what hipster crafty beer I wanted to try, and he chose his. "It's x dollars for yours, y dollars for his," the bartender said while looking at me. I turned around to let my date know how much was his, I'm all for going Dutch... but I'm not into him turning completely around pretending the wall was suddenly very interesting. WTF? I nudged him. "Here's x dollars for mine, he's paying his," I said. And suddenly my date woke up and realized I wasn't paying for his drink. That happened twice that night. "So want to go outside? There's a food truck and I'm hungry" I asked him. "Nah, I'm not hungry". Suddenly annoyed, the best of my personality came out and said "Well, I'll be outside" and walked off. He later joined me and kept asking a lot of questions and agreeing with everything I said. He suddenly liked everything I liked. He suddenly started talking about our next date involving something that is about $50 to do. I lied and said I did not have money. I was turned off by the fact he did not offer to pay for a beer, why would I want to spend $50 on a date with someone I did not enjoy to be around. I never saw him or his baggy clothes again. But the mystery of the bald spot remains.
   
2. First impression: Hi, I kinda want to touch your arms and possibly lick every single one of your tattoos. By the way, I almost didn't come here but now that I'm here... your pictures don't do you any justice. You're like... the cool Austinite dude. Great job with a local festival organization, got the hookups, knew all about music and was very entertaining. First date, local craft cocktails where he said he would get the round, and after I insisted I convinced him to let me get the next. That worked out. I really enjoyed his company, and soon we made plans for our second date. He picked me up one day with breakfast and coffee... simple things like that win me over. We drove to a local brewery where we did not have much beer. We ordered a pizza. He got up to get beer, I gave him a 10 to bring me one. He comes back with my beer, and no change. Should I ask for my money? Is he paying himself back for the breakfast he brought me? I was confused. It was bothering me, The more I thought about it, the more annoying I found him calling me "dude, man". Also the more I noticed how often he interrupted me and how he never really asked me anything of subject. I felt like another guy even if he called me pretty plenty of times, he did not make me feel special at all. Later that night, he invited me out for karaoke with his friends. I did not text him back. I never heard from him again.
   
3. I was patient for this one. This man is sexy, older, experienced, and working abroad when I noticed him online. I gave him my number for whenever he made it back to town because I was closing my account. A month later, he was back, and he "made some time in his schedule to see me". We met at a cocktail bar. First impression: Holy fuck, hot damn, ladies and gentlemen...THIS IS A MAN, and one day I will climb that over 6 ft tall body. I remained casual as I smiled at him from a distance, walking to me to greet me with a hug. I was proud that I did my hair, wore my favorite lipstick, and chose to wear heels. Our styles matched... to me that was a good sign. I could understand why this man apparently did some modeling. We talked a lot about his job and his research, and it's not that he was talking non-stop, I just didn't have enough... I found him somewhat fascinating. The more he talked, the more turned on I felt. This man is PhD educated, talked many things I did not understand but impressed me, has traveled all around, and is doing a lot of the things I would love to do. Also, he did not let me pay for a drink. Impressed. I'm not going to lie, he totally checked plenty of boxes in my check-list. He's also bilingual. And gorgeous. What was planned as a 2 hour date because I initially told him I wanted to be home by 10, went on for 4 hours. I wanted him, He walked me to my car, and the awkward moment of discussing to do this again. Hugged goodbye, and I started to walk away disappointed, I walked back, got on my tip toes even in heels, and planted a shy quick kiss on his lips that would be considered cute in an awkward scene of a romantic comedy movie, but in reality it felt like I was 12 years old. He smiled, and I walked away embarrassed. In my mind I was playing this scene where he pulled me back and gave me a real passionate kiss, you know, not a 12 year old kiss. I got home to a text from him. A smile on my face, and a promise of a better kiss next time. 

So yes, I had plenty of first dates. Some good, some bad. Some more serious than the others. Some boring, some really fun. But the reality is, nothing has changed in these last few months. 

A hairy situation...

Over the last couple of months I have played with the idea of going back to online dating. It is always exciting to judge people on their picture, stalk through their profile to see if they meet a few items on the checklist that most guys in my town meet anyway (is he the kind of guy I could potentially binge-watch Breaking Bad with? Does he love going to concerts? Is he good looking enough for me but probably ugly to others?). This town is full of single men and 80% of them have some kind of online dating profile.  Unfortunately, most, if not all “guys” I've met through online dating do not meet this item on the checklist: a man who is actually ready to start dating and is not a jackass. Also, I can’t find a good picture where I can look educated, with goals and a full-time job, taking no shit from nobody, but still occasionally throws up from drinking, throws water on rude strangers’ heads at the bar, and would re-enact 50 Shades of Grey with the right guy.

I first joined the online dating community a year after I moved to a small town for graduate school. Just like everyone, I used the excuse that I was looking for friends, because if you say you want to go on dates or are looking for love you will either get perverts or no responses at all. However, I did need some friends outside of school. Everyone my age in that town had already married their high school sweetheart and had kids. During that time, I only met 3 guys using that profile. “Jordache”, “Dating Site Murderer” (must be twins with the man on popular meme), and a guy stuck on friend-zone for a year (that I actually ended up getting serious with later). I met all of these guys around the around the time. I remember my computer broke and friend-zoned-guy fixed for me the first time I met him, with my intention to go back to flirting with Jordache. That is kinda messed up when I think about it. But let’s talk about Jordache.

Jordache was this gorgeous 30-something blond blue-eyed guy with nice arms. This guy ran a plant business, had a nice truck, his own place, dressed well, and listened to the right music. Like most guys with a sister, he was the kind of guy who opened doors and never let me pay for a thing, instead he’d always take out cash of his wallet and say “you’re a student, you should never have to pay anything on a date” (swoon, right?). He was also funny and random, for our first date we considered going to a local cat show. I wish that had actually happened. But this story takes place on our last date.

We pulled into El Dorado, a ghetto Mexican club also known for fights, drugs, and guns, after we drove around jamming out to Cults and Nine Inch Nails. Jordache looked hilarious as the only white dude in a crowd of hats and boots. His lack of fucks given as he danced badly to Mexican cumbia was a turn-on. Our fun “Mexican” date evolved into Taco-Bell to go on the back of his truck at a random parking lot. The shots of cheap tequila worked their way out and he was then pissing 3 feet away from me. It was a big turn-off. “But he’s hot”, I thought, so I tried to not let than ruin my idea of him. Wrong. Back at my apartment, we were kissing. I remember he did not kiss like I expected a gorgeous 30 something year old guy to kiss, "we can work on that later, he's hot". But we kept kissing until he said one of the worst things you can say to a girl (“You look fat” being Number 1). He said “You should shave your arms” I pulled away, sat up confused and upset by the random insult.  Yes, I am Mexican and there is a stereotype behind, but I don’t howl at the full-moon. He noticed I was offended and gave his worst explanation. “It’s OK, my ex was Mexican”. He explained how she had an accent, a mustache and was just hairy overall. “You should leave.” Then the most awkward closing-my-apartment-door-on-someone moment in history happened. You know, that moment when he expected a hug-and-kiss goodbye, but I did not give it.

We obviously did not talk after that. I stupidly expected an apology. Just like I expect 30 something year olds to be adults. The only thing that happened is me running into him at a store months later while wearing a white over sized t-shirt, flip flops, shorts with unshaven legs, and no make up. I’m sure I would come up as a Google Image result for “Walmart People”. Of course we both pretended we did not see each other. That was very adult of us... Nah, I actually looked like shit. If I had been wearing my booty jeans I would've walked right by and say "hey" in the most bitch tone of voice I could come up with. You know, the whole "you messed up and missed out on this" type of thing all of women experience.

Almost a year later, he later messaged me on Facebook before I moved out of state. That awkward small talk about concerts and music, then he acted confused with the way things ended between us. He could not believe when I reminded him what he said that night. Instead of apologizing, he said “I must have been intoxicated, but you probably had very dark arm hair”. Seriously? I blocked him. Since then I have learned that most men really do not know how to apologize, even when I think the easiest thing he could have done was take some flowers from his nursery business and leave them by my door or at least a 3 word text. I learned that he was only right about a woman going through school should not be paying during a date (I later dated some men with full-time jobs who did not believe in this! Mistake!). I also learned to not ever date men who are too busy and concerned about body hair rather than enjoying the moment.

My first kiss went something like this...

What is your emotional reaction when you think about your first kiss? I am talking about a real kiss, not about that time you were 4 years old and all the adult females in your family and their friends clapped and took pictures after you were tricked into giving little 5 year old Charlie a peck; also not talking about that time you got to kiss middle school acne Charlie while playing spin-the-bottle. I am talking about the willingly given kiss with that guy that caused some butterfly fluttering sensation in your stomach the moment he told you he liked you. Thought about him now? What is your reaction? My reaction consists of embarrassment and shaking my head.

First kiss: Sam. My age: 15. Location: Bumpy school bus.

I was new in town and new in school. I made my first friends and met Sam on a school bus. Sam wore all black, had chipped black nail-polish on, wore some chains, and listened to the same rock CD on his anti-skip CD player every day. I wore pastels, bras that came in a box that my mom would guess my size for, and Spice Girls worthy platforms. Just earlier that year I saw Backstreet Boys in concert. Sam was everything my family would freak out about if I was friends with.

It did not take too long until Sam and I started sitting together. Weeks later, we wrote letters to each other consisting of drawings, jokes, and making fun of students. A few more days later he asked me to be his girlfriend.  Butterflies… butterflies everywhere. Then terror…. Terror everywhere as I had never had a boy hold my hand and tell me sweet things. Terror… terror all over as I had never kissed a boy. I figured the best thing to do was to put it off until the right moment.

When that moment came, he was polite, despite how his exterior looked and despite he used a permanent marker to draw a tattoo on him every day that his favorite band's lead singer had on his hand. He asked me if he could kiss me as we rode the bumpy school bus back home. Then he went for it. I thought to myself “How hard can it be? I have been practicing by kissing my hand while taking a shower.” But I was not expecting that tongue to try to explore the roof of my mouth on the first kiss. Freaked out, I pulled away, “No! Not one of those [French kisses]!” he just smiled and went for it again, mouth wide open. Bumps later, he stopped. I must let you know, it was my braces that made him stop. You see, braces+sloppy French-kissing+bumpy roads don’t go well together. I looked out of the window for the rest of the ride home as I sneakily wiped all that saliva off the bottom half of my face. It took days for us to try it again.

Sam was the first boy that I called my boyfriend. The first one I kissed and felt butterflies for. The first boy I shared all my secrets with. The guy who eventually gave me a copy of that CD he listened to every day and got me into rock music. He was also the first boy I told I loved in the most random moment that elicited no response but a hug. He was also the first boy that made me cry, after he dumped me by sending his best friend to do it for him. He was also the same boy that unsuccessfully tried to kiss me 5 years later eliciting a sensation of pride in me. I was no longer into sloppy kisses and by that time I bought my own bras and had perfectly straight teeth.