Nostalgic Moment #28

Dating. The word itself causes a variety of emotions. Giddiness, anxiety, nausea... To be honest, the bad emotions always outweighed the good ones and therefore I'm grateful that I don't have to endure "Dating" anymore. Sure I still go on dates with Heidi, but I no longer have to stress about the "What do I do now" moments that would randomly manifest themselves on the various dates I've been on throughout my life.

For example, once when I was dating Heidi in college I was having a miserable time because I had decided to devour an entire bag of dried apricots for lunch earlier that afternoon. Why did I do that? Well, that's not the topic of our conversation this evening, so let us go on. For those of you that haven't made the mistake of eating an entire bag of apricots, you're probably asking yourself what's the big deal. Without divulging too many details about the atrocities that occurred on that date, I'll just leave you with this one image. Unbeknownst to Heidi, she had the displeasure of attending an orchestra concert even though we never left my apartment and sat on the couch watching a movie. The woodwinds were exceptionally loud that evening if you know what I'm saying. What do I do now? Because I was in dating mode, I did the only decent thing I could think of. I ended our date early at around 7 p.m. and left Heidi on her doorstep, but not before departing with one resounding note on my trumpet.

Because I'm married, the "What do I do now" moments are easily answered. Now, when I eat an entire bag of apricots (not a regular practice) I enjoy a much noisier evening watching sports and giggling. Heidi is free to join me if she so desires, but it's at her own risk.

I've been on some real dating doozies in my illustrious career, many of which left me at some point during the date asking myself, "What do I do now?"

1. I've been on back-to-back blind Internet dates with two different strangers that did not turn out favorable. To my defense, I was not the one that set up these dates. I was visiting a friend at his college and he thought it would be fun. It wasn't. On the first date, I actually insulted the girl by mistake and at one point feared for my well-being. What do you do when your first attempt at a blind Internet date goes to the toilet? Simple. Try again. The second date had identical results as the first. I actually thought one of the girls was kind of nice, that was until she drove over two hundred miles to stalk me in my college dorm room. What do I do now? Yeah, with this particular one, I didn't ask myself that question soon enough.

2. My junior year of high school, I was asked by a girl to homecoming. Normally, this is a dance where the guy does the asking. I'm not trying to be a pig, but statistically this was the case, at least it was when I was growing up. What do I do now? Well, she was really cute, so I did what I thought was the right thing to do. Nothing. I didn't do anything. Since I didn't have a car, and was too stupid to arrange it with my parents to drive one of theirs, I rode with my date's mom to homecoming, danced for a while (probably not with any girls... just by myself) and then had her mom drop me off before 10. Oh, and I'm pretty sure instead of a corsage, I gave my date fruit snacks. Okay, maybe that's not entirely true, but it definitely adds to my loserness on this particular date don't you think?

3. Once during my first year of college, I decided to go against the wise advice of one of my friends and ask a very strange girl on a date. I didn't know she was strange at the time, but soon found it out within about thirty minutes of our date. My good friend Don doubled with me and brought along the Burger-flipper girl that worked in the dorm cafeteria. She was something else. All of my friends stumbled over our words whenever we placed our burger orders and I would actually make more than one trip through her line. Partly because she was beautiful and partly because I had early ambitions of destroying my cholesterol.

Since there wasn't much to do in Idaho, Don and I took our dates to a movie. Things were going great. My date was definitely cute and she was from the south which I thought was cool, because I'm from the south too. I was having a grand time telling her stories when all of a sudden my date shushed me violently. I mean she shushed me like I've never been shushed before. There was spit and debris, my ears actually popped from the sound. She had the meanest look on her face as she scolded me for talking during the movie.

Whoa. Hold up. First of all, I wasn't talking during the movie. It wasn't even the previews. I was having a conversation during that opening credit scene where the cool jacket-wearing cat buys candy from the concessions and likes to sit on the front row. Secondly, spit? Seriously?

Naturally, there was this awkward moment that followed her shushing tirade where I had to ask myself "What do I do now?" If you must know, I took the high road. I zipped my lip, smiled apologetically and sat back to watch the movie without making any scene. Of course, I was only biding my time. Like a jaguar crouching low in a thicket preparing to pounce on an unsuspecting Howler monkey, I waited for my moment to strike. It happened about ten minutes into the show when my date politely asked me for another napkin to wipe the butter from the popcorn off her hands. Boy, did I ever lay into her. It was a masterpiece of shushing. It was the loudest shush I've ever done. Actually, to say I shushed her is an understatement. I SHWASHED her. There was spit, oh yes, there was spit. I think I even threw in my own rendition of "Shave and a Haircut" as I showered her with a deluge of spittle. People throughout the theater turned around to see where the shushing was coming from. My date was shocked, embarrassed, infuriated. I was... content and happy. Redemption? I think so. Needless to say, the date ended much earlier than originally planned.

You're probably asking yourself, how in the world did I ever find anyone as pretty as Heidi to marry me and the answer, my friends, is quite simple. I used my incredible charm and I lied straight to her face.