“Chance Encounters
 of the
Close Kind”

© 2010 by Anel Viz. All rights reserved.

 

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 13.  First Date

All the dating services tell you the same thing.  The agencies, Internet sites, mailboxes in the free newspapers and phone lines all warn you to arrange to have your first meeting in a public place.  They invariably suggest getting together for coffee.  I’ve drunk a lot of coffee with men I never saw again.

Now, most of the men I’ve picked up without having made advance arrangements I’ve met in public places – bars, lavatories, the park, an alley in the warehouse district, an adult video arcade.  Those are not the public places they have in mind.  They mean somewhere where they’ll be a lot of people around, preferably in broad daylight.  It’s just possible you’ve unknowingly hooked up with a predator, someone who’s out to rob or rape you, maybe even a serial killer.  (Some go so far as to suggest you ask to see his driver’s license so you know he is who he says is, an unpardonable piece of rudeness, in my opinion.)  Then, after you’ve met, if you’d like to see more of him but still don’t know if you can trust him, you can always go on line and run a criminal background check on the guy.  They don’t mention this possibility, but you could, if you feel that paranoid.  I haven’t.  Ever.

Meet for coffee.  Get to know each other first, they say, see if you’re compatible, if there’s a mutual attraction.  Then go home with him.  I’ve gone home with a lot of men ten minutes after meeting them in a coffee shop.

Coffee because you’ll want to talk to each other to see if he’s the right man for you.  Not drinks, because alcohol can cloud your judgment; not a movie, because you can’t talk there; not a ballgame, because you won’t be able to hear each other talk; not parasailing, because you won’t be together; not a long walk in the country, because you’ll be alone with him; not a full dinner date, because if it turns out the guy’s a loser you’re stuck with him all evening.  Coffee.

It makes sense to follow a “proceed with caution” policy – better safe than sorry, you know – but the most likely danger is that you’ve hooked up with a nerd.  It’s easier to shake him in a coffee shop than if you’ve gone to his house or invited him to yours.  I’ve shaken hands and said goodbye to a lot of nerds in coffee shops.

A few times I’ve arranged to meet someone not at a coffee shop, but none of those meetings has ever led to sex.  So I prefer coffee shops.

One of my first dates suggested we go to the State Fair.  It seemed like a good idea at the time – lots of people around, plenty of different things to see and do, and if he turned out to be a loser it would be easy enough to lose him in the crowd.  We went on the ferris wheel and got stuck on the top for over an hour.  The guy was a total nerd who kept up his boring, non-stop chatter the whole time and made an hour seem like an eternity.  If we’d been in a coffee shop, I could have got up and left.

Another invited me to be his date at his office picnic.  He assured me that his co-workers were a liberal bunch, he was out to all of them and they were very accepting.  Accepting is both putting it mildly and not quite accurate.  It was embarrassing; I found myself surrounded by a lot of people I didn’t know and he did, and the center of attention: “Are you Jonathan’s new partner?  How did you meet?  Have you been going together long?”  When I explained that we weren’t partners, that this was our first date and that we’d met over the phone lines, they were shocked, and their opinion of Jonathan and gay men in general took a nose dive.

I thought the guy I arranged to play miniature golf with sounded promising.  “We can sink a few balls,” he said.  I liked his sense of humor.  He had not been making a joke, and wouldn’t have got it if someone else made it.  Besides, he was like the Science Museum guy (yeah, I met someone at the Science Museum too), only looking to make new friends.  I have nothing against friends, I just like them to have a sense of humor.

Meeting at the beach sounded perfect.  I’d see him with a bare chest, maybe in a speedo.  And he was a beauty.  We got on great, and the chemistry was there.  We could have gone and had sex in the dunes if there had been any, but it was a very public, very crowded, very exposed beach.  It had taken each of us over an hour to drive there, so turning around and going straight home to play didn’t appeal to us.  We decided to spend a few hours at the beach and then have him follow me to my place in his car.  I lost him along the way and he didn’t have a cellphone.  When I called him from home he was pissed off and didn’t want to see me again.

Still more tempting was the chance to be a guest at my date’s health club for a game of racquetball.  No surprises when I got him into bed: I’d get to watch him undress in the locker room, we’d sit naked together in the sauna.  For an in-shape guy he only had so-so body, but nothing I’d turn my nose up at.  Ten minutes into the game, the ball hit me square in the nuts.  My scrotum swelled up like a balloon, and I had to go to the emergency room, where an all-thumbs intern drained the blood pooled around my testicles by plunging an enormous syringe right where it hurts most.

I’ll stick to coffee, thank you.

 

Posted: 02/26/10