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My own comedy of errors. And this shit is true. Seriously.

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The only thing that is going to offer any kind of credibility to the following story is the simple fact that I could not really be making shit like this up, because if I could, I would no longer need a day job (and for the record, I DO need a day job, so if anyone has any fabulous ideas, call me.) For dramatic effect (though little is needed) I am going to start in the middle. We’ll see how that goes…

Apparently a funny thing happens to people when they get to be a “certain” age; they start to really re-evaluate their lives and, depending on said analysis, they start taking actions that might be slightly out of character. I am being euphemistic there. Basically, when people get to an age where they start to look at their lives more from the point of how they are ever going to get to do all the things they want to do rather than from the point of view that they have forever to do all the things they want to do, they start doing some whacked out shit. I believe I am at or around that age. Whether I have succumbed to the whacked-out-shit-phase is likely a fairly subjective notion.

One of the things that has fully dominated the psyches of many of the women I know and the men who will admit it within my peer group, is the partnering-up urge. It’s like a latent Sex & the City virus. I have never been married (or divorced – win!) so I will have to speak to some of these things as an observer rather than a practitioner, but I certainly have been on the coupling up bandwagon. Due to some pretty choice moments over the past couple of years, I am much more detached from this phenomenon, but it lingers and occasionally rears its ugly little head into my otherwise pretty satisfying life. One of these head-butts contributed to my creating a profile on an on-line dating site. Yeah, yeah. It was as bad as I could have ever imagined it. But as they say, ‘all my friends were doing it’ – and no, I would not jump off a bridge if ‘all my friends were doing it’ (mom) but, I thought, “Hey, it is the information age, maybe this is how people do it these days… I shouldn’t knock it until I try it.” [Error #1: not trusting my gut instinct that this was a really bad idea, at least for me - people who are unfamiliar with IRL dating should not embark on the virtual variety. Real. Talk.]

After creating a profile and meeting approximately three people, all of whom were really prefect for that scene, and totally repulsive to me, I realized that this was not the way forward no matter how many people told me they ‘met their husband on Match’ or they had a neighbor who found their soul mate in some forum, on such and such website. I was done. I happened to be having this conversation with two of my closest HK friends in October of 2008 as we sat in Carnegie’s enjoying a nice adult beverage. Now, one of these friends is committed to the on-line dating world and she is sticking with it, full throttle and has a clear agenda. The other could not be more of the opposite. I guess I was sort of the one in the middle, on the proverbial fence… but I was getting ready to jump over into friend #2′s yard. We were talking about the ins and outs of all of this: dating, meeting people, marrying people… The pros, cons, pressures, stereotypes, assumptions. All of it. It was sounding worse by the second and I was sure I was making the right decision to leap off the fence. In the midst of the conversation, my iPhone did its little techno bleep letting me know I had new mail. I checked it. It was an email from someone on the soon-to-be-deleted dating website. [Timing adds so much to this story.]

We/I opened the email. I looked at the message which said something along the lines of “I am from San Diego and graduated from UCSD and now live in San Francisco and travel to Asia frequently for business and will be there this weekend and your smile caught my attention and then I saw the UCSD connection and that there was a PoliSci connection and so hey.” In typing this now, the number of red flags seems more apparent than I thought at the time for sure, not the least of which is the implication of bullshit that can be detected from such effusive run-on sentences. I looked at his photo.

I knew this dude.

Seriously. And the way I knew him was not a really nice way. In order to not suffer complete humiliation, let’s just say there was an evening back in 1990 that involved the Pub @ UCSD, a super dodgy ride back to Del Mar in a van after my wingman hooked up with someone at the bar and then some very uncomfortable events at a house down the street from mine that housed a number of frat boys, ending in a teary walk home and some very nervous TKEs in the subsequent days. Whatever. I chalked it up to a learning experience and moved on.

Looking at the his photo fifteen years later I had to laugh. I emailed my college roommate who knew the whole story: should I tell Dating-Site-Dude that I knew him? She gave a categorical “NO” as her final answer. I then emailed DSD and told him that there was a bunch of stuff happening in HK that weekend and if any of it sounded interesting he could let me know and meet up with my friends and me. He emailed back immediately and enthusiastically. Okay fine. I shared the whole story with the girls over another adult beverage and we were in agreement that if nothing else, this shizz was going to be interesting.

Over the next couple of days more emails were exchanged and then we met up after I finished work on a Friday night, I was heading to The Wanch to see my friends’ band, he would come along. He was polite (mostly) and complimentary (in a pervy way – “Sorry I was slow to get in the taxi, I am an ass man so I had to take a look at your ass. It’s nice….” – Really, you’re going to go there? I felt like I was with Cousin Eddie or something… “really niiiice….”) Alright, at least some beers had been imbibed at this point so my humor threshold was adjusted to the necessary depths. The show was fun and everyone seemed to get along and were well-behaved (by Lamma standards.) As we missed the last ferry by unanimous decision, we all ended up in a couple of sampans heading back to the island. And lo and behold DSD was right there with us. “You wanna come to Lamma?” I was surprised. Okay, that makes me sound like a jackass I am aware, but seriously, I was thinking he must have some sweet hotel set-up and such and why would he want to come out to some random island with a rowdy group of girls. Now I sound like a bigger jackass, but it really is how I was thinking at the time. I was also not bothered by anything so… you know. [Do I need to even mention this was Error #2?]

I had to work the next morning and by the time the alarm went off, there was not one decision from the previous evening that was looking very impressive. Then there was the “getting off the island” issue. In a very Survivor-like way, island removal is impossibly public from my village. There is no way to maintain any sort of morning-after discretion. I was going to have to suck this one up behind huge dark glasses and hope a lot of people were not working that day. Epic fail. And then work sucked, but DSD said he would really like to take me out to dinner after. Okay, fine. We actually had a pretty nice time especially considering I was shattered by dinner time. It turned out that he had actually lived in the same building as one of my closest friends from home while he was in NYC. They knew each other because of their dogs (don’t ask, urban dog people are a special breed; these two actually identified all the people in their co-op by dog first and address second.) This seemed to add some positive context to the whole situation, and under calmer conditions, he seemed pretty cool. Small detail: he was short and ginger and so, ummm, yeah Error #3. Making a long story that need not be so long a slight bit shorter, I’ll just say he went to China, and kept in touch and then came back and we had another date, by which I mean he met me and my on-line dating expert friend out and came along with us for the day and for dinner. Then that was it. The whole thing felt odd to me, but I assumed it was because as a serial monogamist (admittedly not a great one) I was unfamiliar with the whole concept of ‘dating.’ [Error #4.]

Limited contact ensued as time went on. We were friends on Facebook and so I suppose that lent an air of legitimacy. I had little intention of really running into him again, I mean, I lived in Hong Kong and he was in San Francisco, a meet up would definitely take some work. Guess what? I know. Since my April 2009 trans-Pacific meet-up was not happening, I called DSD while I was in the City. [Error #5.] He was apparently so excited, he immediately met up with me and my friends at a location completely inconvenient for him. My saviour of that weekend was a bit tipsy and thought he was great, but she was also trying to get a really bad motocross jacket off this other wanker so I will not hold her responsible for any of this – and J, you know I love you but that jacket was heinous. Anyhow, DSD and I went out to dinner and had a pretty okay time. He kept saying he could not believe I was there and it was so incredible and he was so glad I called and why was I there and that doesn’t really matter I guess and wow you are here that is such a trip. [Long sentence alert.] I was like, can I get some more tacos al pastor? I never told him that I was actually there to see someone else who I could not connect with, either way we decided that we would go to the Exploratorium the next day because it is rad and I had tickets.

When I called to find out where to meet him, he did that whole, “I have no reception on the phone” thing, and then refused to answer later calls. Eventually, he texted me and said something along the lines of ‘sorry it is just not like it was in Hong Kong and I know this is lame but I can’t hang out and so I’ll talk to you later.’ Okay, it is not like I was actually all that broke up about this but seriously, dude, you’re 40. Pick.Up.The.Phone. And that was pretty much it. Or was it?

As I mentioned, we were connected via @*$&!%# –> Facebook. There was even photographic evidence that we knew each other. And he had also “friended” (I still am not okay with that being a verb) my friend C who we had hung with in HK. I figured this was my chance to channel Chili Palmer and simply be cool. It would be the new mature me to just not be bothered by it, and I wasn’t. It was sort of amazing. About a month after I was in SF, he made a big Facebook proclamation that he had gotten engaged. Now that was kind of funny and C and I had a right laugh wondering if the fiance was aware that he had been “dating” other people a month earlier. Whatevs. I was already onto something far more intriguing. He tied the knot in January 2010 and relatively soon after that I decided to commit online suicide and there went my only connection to DSD. I didn’t even notice.

Fast forward to, uh, now: May 2010. I am in India. I come back to Hong Kong. I finally manage to catch up with C who tells me she has quite a story for me. I cannot imagine, but I know Lamma is always good for intrigue. This story was not about Lamma. DSD had maintained his FB connection with C and had messaged her. He was going to be in Hong Kong, his body was looking amazing and he hoped she would be able to play with him… perhaps the three of us could play together. I’ll save you all from the rest of the not-good-enough-for-a-Harlequin-Romance details. She was horrified and promptly deleted him. For clarity, I messaged him and said, “I certainly hope C is having some sort of lost in translation moment – because what she just told me is outrageous. Assuming that is the case, I hope you are well. Otherwise, fucking behave.” He replied with amazing speed: “Definitely something lost in translation. Hope you are well. DSD.” I replied once more that I guessed we would see. After seeing the evidence of his B-grade attempts at, what? Seduction? Porn? Who the hell knows… I emailed him again and said: “DUDE. You are an idiot. Aren’t you MARRIED?” And blocked him.

If this is what ‘coming of age’ has morphed into, we are beyond a generation of swine; we are totally fucked. Following the blockage and after a perfectly contented night of sleep on my end, I woke up to a desperate text message from the 415. “Could not reply through facebook for some reason. I am an idiot and I was not being serious. I am happily married. My apologies to both of you. I will not bother either one of you again.”

Now, I have no idea if DSD met his “wife” on a dating site or whatever, and I hardly can bring myself to believe that someone married for only five months could get himself caught up in something this stupid, (and let’s not even get started on the “I was not being serious” part… I wonder if his wife would be cool with this jokester?) I did notice the intentional modifier placed before the word married, and as a die-hard abuser of adjectives and adverbs, I know over-emphasis when I see it. Is this what people call a midlife crisis? Is this DSD just a total moron? Worse yet, is this what my friends and I are working with out there? I know our culture suggests that my lifestyle is an aberration. (At least I am allowed to be an aberration, in India my lifestyle would simply not happen.) And honestly my lifestyle is not that outlandish. I would not even say it is “alternative.” I am single. I do not and will not internet date. I do not have kids and while not categorically opposed to the concept, I am not convinced I need to. I am pretty much content all the time. And I certainly hope that this Big Birthday staring at me from out there in September is not going to lead me down Incompetent Highway or Delusional Drive as it clearly did for DSD.

Maybe I will just get a few more cats…..


Filed under: Absurd Shit, Chasing the Life I was Supposed to Want, Relationships, true stories Tagged: Chili Palmer, Cousin Eddie, dating, delusional narcissists, dishonesty, disinformation, douchebags, Generation of Swine, Get Shorty, girlfriends, Harlequin Romance, Hong Kong, marriage, Old School, on-line dating, People who need to really find something better to do with their time, Poor relationship choices, Relationships, San Francisco, Sex and the City, The Poor Choices Show Podcast, You've Got Mail

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