Art, Poetry and Life

Talking about blind dates over in Carlos’s blog post: “When Drooling Anticipation Doesn’t Pay”, we also got to talking about being stood up. While I don’t remember ever being on a blind date, I got to thinking about the time I was stood up. Was never stood up when I was young and single. This happened when I was in my fifties and single. 51 to be exact.

I was an administrative assistant at a residential treatment facility and a new chef was just hired. He was quite funny and always had everyone laughing. Anyway, we got to talking about life and such and exchanged numbers. He had said he was 51, the same age as me, and he was single. We talked on the phone for perhaps a week as we weren’t allowed to stand around talking where we worked.

One time on the phone I suggested we meet at a coffee house so I told him where and when. He never showed up. I knew he was new to the area so figured he couldn’t find. When I came home there was a message from him. I was right, he couldn’t find it so went home, and then was called into work. The next Monday at work, he apologized profusely.

Again, for another week we talked lots on the phone about everything. He seemed really nice, told me much about his life and nothing seemed odd.....yet.

We made another date to meet for coffee, this time at a different place, one that was well known, and in an area he said he knew. A half hour before I was to leave, he called and said that he was called into work again, only had a couple of minutes and to meet him at the Safeway parking lot which was near our work. This time a red flag went up. He’s asking me to meet him at an effing parking lot?

Got to the parking lot and he showed up fifteen minutes later. He gets out of his car and I immediately could tell he was nervous and couldn’t figure out why. I’m not the intimidating sort. I noticed he stood about six feet away from me with his arms folded and had a very strange look on his face. Red flag. He actually looked as if he was scared shitless.

He apologized first for being late and said he had driven to the coffee house to see if one was really there. I said “What?” He said his roommate, said I might be lying and setting him up. Again, I said “What?” Then he said his roommate said he should come clean with me so that I would come clean with him. What?

In a couple of our phone conversations, he had mentioned his roommate and how much he appreciated how much he had helped him. I figured it was moving to this state and helping with jobs and money. Nope.

Turned out his roommate was also is AA sponsor. AA is Alcoholics Anonymous. He promised me he’d been sober for a year. Ok, fine....I said, and asked him what the hell he meant about ME coming clean. He said his roommate told him I was probably lying about my age and being divorced and everything else I’d said to him. Red Flag. Two suspicious idiots living together isn’t a good thing.

I said “I didn’t lie” and started to open my car door to leave at this point I was so infuriated with this whole business.

Then he said wait “I have something else to tell you”.

He said he was really 36 and not 51 and that now that he’s told me the truth, I should do the same and that we could start all over with all the cards on the table. I started laughing, got in my car and left.

During the next two weeks I quit my job (not because of him), my ex had a heart attack and heart surgery, my daughters came into town and the three of us were over at their dad’s helping out. This guy called me every night wanting to talk. I never returned his calls. The last straw was when he called me drunk. He left me a message that he went off the wagon because of me and said: “Where the hell are you?”

He knew, from a very brief conversation my last day of work, that my ex had had a heart attack and my daughters were coming into town.

I can almost remember my message to him verbatim: “YOU want to know where the hell I am? YOU lie to me about your age, YOU break two coffee dates with me, accuse ME of lying and making you drink and YOU have the balls to ask me where the hell I am?" I don't remember if the last things I said was "Go F*** yourself" or "Go to hell". But he never called again.