My new apartment doesn’t have a washer and dryer. Well, we have one, but it’s in the super creepy basement and it’s tied in with my downstairs neighbor’s utilities, so I just don’t really want to use it.
Dee-lite was out of town this weekend so I asked her if I could go over to her house and use her washer and dryer to get my laundry done. While I was there, I watched TV, had a Woodchuck cider and a fudge pop and updated my OkCupid profile (again). The chaos of the last two months has left me feeling a bit reclusive and I’ve realized lately that I’m being a bit of a hermit. I’m choosing to stay home rather than go out with my friends or go on dates. Truth be told, I haven’t been on an actual date since October. (I’m not counting any of my time with the Hot Single Dad because, let’s face it, we’re fuck buddies — there is no dating going on there.)
So, I updated my profile. It doesn’t really have that Baconator shine yet, but I’m going to work on it later and make it sparkle. I also got an email on OkCupid tonight — perhaps that’s what triggered this response in me. My profile, up until tonight, made a very defensive declaration that I have either dated, emailed, rejected or ignored all the available men in my area on OkCupid, so… Clearly, not the kind of profile that is inviting attention from men.
But I got an email tonight with the subject line, “Not Everyone.” My interest was piqued, and I replied. He’s a successful engineer living in the ‘burbs. Seems like a nice enough dude, but really, I think his email was probably just the wakeup call that I needed right about now.
Of course, I haven’t explored all of my options. No doubt, the last seven or eight months of dating has been rather… unsuccessful. Flopping with the Hot Single Dad (again), finding out Ginger was a low-down cheater and watching the flames with Dr. Dude disappear almost as quickly as they appeared certainly hasn’t inspired a lot of optimism on my part.
But I realized tonight, after spending four hours alone in my best friend’s empty house, in the car on my ride back to my house: there are so many available men in this city.
I’m sitting at the traffic light, windows down (because, HELLO! Spring has finally showed her god damn head), listening to some indie rock music on a CD that Dee-lite made me, and what ho! In the car next to me, there was a man, a CUTE man. Looking at me.
Granted, my heaping laundry basket in the passenger seat did nothing but clutter up the view, but he was cute and he was looking at me. He smiled, I smiled back, the light turned green and I thought that would be the end of that little flutter in my stomach.
But no… We were on the perfect windy road, carving our way through midtown, grateful for every red light we seemed to be catching. And we seemed to catch them all.
At each light, he would always seem to end up right next to me or right behind me. If he was next to me, he would pull his car up enough so that he would have to physically crane his neck to look back at me — his body language was clear. Yes, cute boy. I see you. I’m smiling coyly at you. You’re doing that cute boy thing where you smile at me and look away and then look back with a straight face.
The double take. Ahhh. It felt good.
I wondered, as we were driving, if he’d follow the same road all the way to my apartment. I fantisized in my head that he’d follow me and get out of his car and want to talk to me. Then I panicked a bit — here I was, playing the flirtation game with my eyes in traffic — above the neck, I was cute as could be. Messy hair, blowing in the cool nighttime air. But below the neck, I was braless, in the same shirt I slept in last night, wearing yoga pants that were a touch too big for me. My legs were totally hairy and I was wearing my stinky slip-on sneakers with no socks.
Clearly, I wasn’t prepared for this fantasy. Thankfully, he turned off our path, down another road. I realized that my heart sank a little when he turned away.
So what does this tell me? My mojo has been sleeping. I have quit caring about everything, being lost in the shuffle of work and family and random chaos. But what’s happening around me right now?
It’s spring time. It’s go time. God, I forget how much I love spring time. I forget, every winter, how fantastic that first cool jacket-less night is — when your body just quakes and shakes the cold chill of winter off and you are reborn.
It’s a beautiful thing.
Watch out, world. I’m going to start dating again.
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