I'm Not Coming To Your Party Guurrrllll

I'm sure that most of you would never guess this about me, but I don't date much. I have a lot of friends, but dating scares the CRAP out of me. I will say "no" more often than "yes" and I don't see anything wrong with that. Recently they have really been pushing dating in our ward and saying yes when a boy gets up the nerve to ask us out.

I haven't had much luck with dating but haven't had any real examples or excuses for saying no. This last Sunday, I was passed a note in Sunday School that read : "Will you go out with me on Tuesday? (insert name and #). Thinking back to the conversation I had just had with my friends I decide, how bad could it be...?

After class he walked over to me and I quickly respond, "sure, sounds fun" and head to my last meeting of the day.

Indeed, how bad could it be... before I get to engrossed in the details of this one date let me break down my track record for you.

In high school I went on 3 dates... 1 was organized by my friend just so Prom wouldn't be my first date, it was mostly just a party with all my friends, but someone picked me up and took me back home.

Then there was Prom... it was a total disaster, in fact, it has scarred me for life and I will not discourage my children to attend school dances, but in NO WAY will I encourage them if they are leaning more towards not attending them.

Finally, Sadie Hawkins... I am still debating wether to consider this an actual date, but for this particular scenario that is how we'll refer to it. I actually had a lot of fun. Until out of nowhere he starts trying to cuddle with me and play with my hair... excuse me, what? No, no, no. That was the end of that.

Since graduation, I have been on 5 dates. First there was 'Diablo'(that was his myspace** name,don't judge me), he had no personality at all. He took me to see 'The Messengers' and the only thing we talked about at all was Mexicans, he was from Mexico City and he made fun of Mexicans the whole time. Am I allowed to laugh? (Maybe I should consider this when I tell fat jokes about myself to skinny people) Then there was 'The Stalker'... Who drove down to my house and sat on my couch for a total of 6 hours. The highlight; he drove me to Wal-mart and bought me and energy drink. Let's see, next we have Cherry Pie, who ingested an entire can of cherry pie filling with a spoon, straight from the can. Do I have to explain any further?

**I did not meet him on MYSPACE, I just happen to know that was his name.

Then there was, Note Guy. I spent an hour doing my hair, I made sure that my make-up was perfect... not overdone, not underdone perfect for an early evening on a summer date. I made sure to dress appropriately for dinner and a movie.

He showed up in flip-flops, ratty jeans and a t-shirt. When he opened his car door for me, it was filthy. He confesses immediately "Sorry, I didn't have time to clean out my car." I quickly respond, "life happens sometimes, no big deal." In my head I'm thinking about how often I wish that my car were cleaner, remembering how sometimes when we go to lunch and I'm not expecting to drive I can be embarrassed at a little garbage in my car.

His car smells like Cinnamon, scratch that it smells like Cinnamon aerosol air-freshener has exploded in his car. "oh it smells... nice..." tumbles out of my mouth... "that it does." Is his clever response, he goes on to say "it's better that is smell nice and look dirty, then smell dirty and look clean." I give a small yet convincing courtesy laugh.

"I have some bad news" he claims as we are pulling out of the driveway. He pulls out a Tucano's birthday coupon that reads "Buy one, get one" and proceeds to tell me a story. "Today is August 31st, this coupon is buy one get one and needs to be used by the end of the month so I was planning on taking you there and then out to a movie. But, the thing is... you have to pay for one meal to get the other for free, and right now I can't afford even one meal... I thought it would be a good idea to go to the dollar store instead and see what we could find for dinner, then go have a picnic at the park and end the evening by watching a movie at your house. How does that sound?" It took me about 30 seconds for my brain to wrap itself around what he had just said, I hear myself saying "that sounds like it could be fun" (while my brain is screaming... 'why did you just tell me all those things? What did that accomplish? I'm all for that green glass kind of love, but why did you just break it down for me? Why not say, I had this really good idea to go see what we could come up with at the dollar store and then make dinner somewhere? Then if dinner goes well, suggest a movie.' )I plaster on my smile and brace myself for the rest of the evening.

I try to make conversation and ask "So, what did you today?" He quickly responds, " it was great, I had class for an hour this morning and then did nothing else all day, it was my day off today." Again, I hear myself say "what are you studying?" While my head is thinking 'you didn't have time to clean out your car because you were busy doing nothing all day, even though you knew that you would be going on a date, and that you would be driving... awesome.'

He gets excited as he tells me that he's taking a computer graphics class and his homework is playing video games and interactive games online all the time. "Needless to say, I get plenty of practice" he brags. I am not impressed by anything that has gone on so far this evening and am already ready for this date to be over. It has been a total of 10 minutes since my doorbell rang.

He then starts talking about how he used to drive a BMW but he had to sell it because he couldn't afford it and complaining about how he hates money. I have very little patience for this sort of thing and try and change the subject, only to have my efforts blasted by his resolute attitude of money is the root of all the world's problems.

We pull in to the dollar store and as we are walking in he asks "What would you like to be on the menu tonight?" I politely tell him I would like him to decide. This witty guy retorts, "well, then you have to eat whatever I choose." (sort of the trade off isn't it, if I want you to decide I have to eat what you want to eat??) He then walks directly to the bleach aisle and tells me that's what we are having for dinner. I counter, "listen, I know giving up your car was hard but that is no reason to want life to end so quickly and painfully. We should both try and live through the night." We then proceed to wander around the store looking at food that needs to be prepared. He settles on some dill pickle chips, tortilla chips with medium salsa (I should add that MILD salsa is to spicy for me sometimes) and some Crunch&Munch.

Next we pick a movie out at Red Box and then head over to the gas station for drinks. He reaches into the back seat of his filthy car and pulls out two dirty cups, one still having soda in it from the last person who drank out of it. I gag as I try and choke down a few sips. (at this point I have rinsed it out with water and coke, coke kills everything, right?) When we finally make it back to the car, two drinks in dirty cups later, he decides that the ideal place to have a picnic is a popular make-out spot. I was horrified. I kept turning up the radio and making no conversation that did not involve the music, I have never been put in a situation like this and wasn't sure how to respond. After about 10 minutes he finally said, "maybe we should make our way over to your house?" (YES PLEASE!!!, my head screamed)

We made it back to my house and watched the movie. As soon as it was over I got up to turn it off, he was quick to remind me that the movie was not over because we had to play a game and count how many times our respective names came up in the credits. "Well, I'm going to take a bathroom break, you watch for my name. K?" I responded. The credits were painfully long and drawn out, but finally they ended. He was preparing to leave, and I was not trying to stop him in any way, shape or form. I handed him the refillable cup back and told him he should keep it for an emergency date idea, to which he responded "I'll save it, so that next time you can use it again." Then as he was moseying out the front door, he turned and gave me a hug saying "See ya later bud"

There are no words to express how I was feeling at that particular moment, I ran upstairs to share my story with my family. Then I called my friends thinking, this can't possibly be as bad as it felt, I am overreacting, only to have them confirm to me that I was in fact being much nicer than he deserved. I feel a little bad that I am using this as entertainment for people, but then again... what else should I do? Certainly not encourage this sort of behavior or wish this on anyone else. Women in the dating world need to be prepared for this sort of thing, they need to be ready to put a stop to these sort of things right from the get go, and someone needs to share with him the error of this whole experience.

You've probably forgotten by now that I said I've been on 5 and that was only 4. Well, I don't have a name for the 5th one yet. But what I do have is my first 2nd date ever...