I saw him from my car and thought “Damn, please don’t let that be him”.    He trudged across the parking lot trailing misery with every step.   His shoulders hunched in his camouflage outfit, oddly out of place in the middle of the city.  Great, I thought, my first date with a depressed Grizzly Adams.  All I wanted to do was drive on by and pretend I got lost, or died, or had an emergency in another universe.  Damn, Damn, and Damn, that polite part of me that won’t let me blow off an obviously unpleasant experience.  I pulled into the parking lot, hoping that when he said he was “getting his beauty sleep”, that included a bath.  I was wrong.

He had an odd little goatee, parted in the middle, sweeping to either side, as though his handlebar moustache had gotten lost on his face.  His skin was weathered and mottled with dark patches under his eyes.  He looked like a demented gnome in hunters drag.  I was screwed.  All week, he had been emailing me about how excited he was to go on this date, he was into me, found me fascinating, interesting, he wanted to share his darkest secret with me, blah, blah, blah.  With each email, my enthusiasm for the date had dwindled.  Not that I play hard to get, or freak out when someone shows interest.  OK, that’s completely wrong.  I do tend to bolt when someone shows interest. But, I hadn’t met this person yet, and already he seemed to be picking out wallpaper without me.  I felt blindsided by the fantasy of it all.  I had agreed to meet him before all the freaky emails, and now I felt stuck, nervous, hollow. 

At our table, I discovered that I had absolutely nothing to say.  Now, I am normally pretty gregarious, and can hold fabulous conversations on the subject of dinnerware, but today, I couldn’t dredge up any interest in conversation.  Conversation was stilted at best.  He started listing all the injuries he’d suffered, paralyzed arm, blind in one eye and the other not much better, severed, reattached fingers, the list went on.  He talked about himself, his work, his ex, his life.  In every story, he had suffered some wrong at the hands of his ex, the union, various bosses, the list went on.  Then, he hit me with the big one….  He was a former dog catcher, who, and I quote, “loved the killing a little too much”.  At times, I could see barely controlled rage bubble up to the surface as the litany of failures and rejection.  Every time the rage surfaced, all I could think of was the simple refrain “Thank God it’s day, and he’s crippled.” 

At the beginning of the date, I was annoyed that I had dressed up for such a disrespectful boor.  I was pissed that this guy, didn’t have the decency to at least put on clean clothes.  By the end, however, I was just happy to get out of there.  I have to admit that I lied.  I told him I had an appointment, set in stone, and fixed since the dawn of time.  When the check finally came, I asked to “go dutch”.  He didn’t bat an eyelash.  He took my $20, put it in his wallet, and pulled out a $50 to pay for lunch.  According to my calculations, I was owed at least $5.00.  “Chalk it up to experience” I thought silently. 

He wanted to walk me to my car, he wanted to chat, he wanted to spend time together, and I wanted out of there.  I wanted to never speak to, or see, this person again.  His last words to me were “don’t worry, I move pretty slow, I couldn’t hurt you if I wanted to.”  Under normal circumstances, I would feel awful.  Today? I got in my truck and went to a movie.