I’m going to tell you a little story about how random my dating life is.
For the past, oh, 8 years, I’ve been trying to use my mother’s influence as a college professor to my advantage. By this I mean, I’ve been trying to convince her to scope out good looking guys in her classes as possible candidates for romance. Now, I realize this may be unethical, attempting to take advantage of my mother’s access to the budding minds and bodies of tomorrow, but when you’re in a situation like mine, you start to get a little desperate. My low point came when I realized that I had almost nothing in common with any of the boys in my class and I needed to start looking up.
When I was about fourteen, while the boys in my class were throwing spit balls at each other and trying to burp the loudest in order to peacock their way into our common female peripheral vision, I was trying to talk to them about things. Not things which would actually interest them, like boobs or food, but other things; books, music, the conflicts in the middles east and their not so positive views on the “gentler” sex. I didn’t have much luck with this approach.
As I got older, I realized I was being a little too picky with the traits I was looking for in a man. Smart, funny, capable of carrying on a multi-syllable conversation, able to read beyond the eleventh-grade level, not smelly, seriously, able to read anything without more than one picture per page, interest in my mind and not just my ass…the ability to write “attractive” correctly in a text, or use the work attractive in a sentence period instead of hot. All of these were simply beyond my reach, given the limited availability of boys in my class. (I studied at a private school and my graduating senior class was of twenty one students…more than half of them being girls.) My educational/social pool simply wasn’t deep enough to hold the variety of men that I felt would somehow better flavor my life. The kind of men I read about in my paperbacks; dark, brooding, with a hint of danger than made you only want to try and fix them all the more. This was pre-Twilight, so none of them sucked blood to live or glittered more than the average boy in the daylight.
Literature had ruined me for the real boys in my life, and I knew I’d never be happy simply dating one of them. And so, my quest began…
My mother was always telling me about the guys in her classes. She’d tell me the story about the boys who played pranks in class. The ones who spoke out loudly while she was trying to teach, but later came up to her and revealed a deep and hidden interest in science and the world. The ones who were drop dead cute, but already dating/married to/engaged to someone and thus unavailable to me in every way. It was like having my own real life audio candy store. Except filled with hot guys. Whether they were actually attractive in my tastes, I’ll never know. I almost never met the boys she spoke of, being much younger, and when I did they tended to underwhelm. I clung to hope though; knowing that someday she’d find the flower blooming among the weeds and he’d be all “Hey, ‘sup?” and I’d be all “Nothing much. ‘Sup with you?”
It would be magical.
Well, the years went by and I never did meet my prince charming through my mother’s student database. I met and dated my own range of boys. Some more successful than others in peeking my interest, other boring me beyond what I imagined possible. And then, we reached this semester…
I, once again, harangued my mother until she relented and agreed to scout out a good looking specimen; despite the fact that in about two weeks I’d be moving to another continent. Finally, she comes home one day and tells me, “I’ve found him! I have a boy in my class! He is cute and funny. I think you’d like him!” Joy and hurrah! The day had finally come! I insisted that the next time she had class with said student, she take a picture with him, so that I may see if he was indeed cute in my eyes. She agreed, but only if she could tell him what the picture was for. I thought it funny and said “Sure. What’s the worst that can happen?” Comedy really does strike when one least expects it…
A few days later she arrives home and after eating dinner together, I follow her upstairs to her room and ask her about the picture. She tells me a little about the mystery man, vague details about his class habits and personality, and ends the description with this little nugget of information: I had, apparently, dated this boy before! My minds went blank. How could this be possible? My list of former beaus was sadly short enough to be counted on one hand. At least those lasting enough to be considered someone I “dated”. I ask her for more details. As she continues on describing him and how we had apparently had a thing, I realize who she’s talking about…
My mother took a picture with a boy I had “dated” when I was about eleven years old…We met at a day camp in the summer, held hands for about three days, talked on the phone a bit, and then never spoke again. This was the boy my mother though was so cute. The boy who dropped the L bomb on me after talking for a few days, over the phone, when he was two years younger than me, and who I never spoke to again…I didn’t know whether to laugh at how funny the situation was, laugh at the fact that he actually remembered me, or feel saddened by the fact that in the whole pool of testosterone swimming around me, the only boy in a UNIVERSITY that my mother found who mildly fit my deepest wishes was someone who I had already met and discarded when I was eleven…
What else could I do? I laughed long and hard with my mother about it. When I went with her to work in order to use the internet and saw him in her class, I made a funny face and looked away. I didn’t dare actually say hi and talk about how my mother came close to almost setting us up. I felt embarrassed by my younger self and how she couldn’t handle crushes back then, and I wondered how my future self would feel about these kinds of events and what a spaz I am now.
It’s funny how small a small island can really be… I wonder how many more moments of reliving my past I’ll have once I move. I doubt many, since I don’t actually know many people in NYC and can’t possibly date enough of them to casually be set up with them twice. I wonder where life and love will take me. Who knows if the boy I think is Mr. Wrong now is actually Mr. Wrong Right Now But Much More Suited To You In About Five Years? I certainly don’t know and never will.
All I do know is that I’m done having my mother scope out man candy for me in her classrooms. I just can’t run the risk of her setting me up with exes anymore. They should live in the fantasy that I’m happy and successful; dating someone steadily for four years now and just waiting for him to pop the question. It wouldn’t do to have them know I’m still single and looking, content with my life but open to having my other half bump into me one day.
We can’t have them know that I’m a normal person with normal feelings, hoping for love but fearing the crushing weight of rejection, now can we?
