Day 16: Let the awkward social interactions BEGIN!

As a rule, I attract…um…people. But not usually the people I was hoping to attract. Everyone has stories like this. Here’s one of mine:

A while back, I was waiting for someone in a bar. We were going to hangout, have a drink and get to know each other. It wasn’t quite a date. It was more of a pseudo-I might want to go on a date with you- pre-screen date. I had gotten there a little early, grabbed a beer and was sitting, watching the ESPN highlights (gay sports bar dates are not necessarily as hot as you’d think) and people watching. This was before I could use my phone to solely absorb all of my attention.

While I was sitting there, a gentleman wondered up – very intoxicated and asked if I have a lighter. I smoked at the time, so I did. He introduced himself. We’ll say his name was Don. Don was rangy and sort of leathery, skinny in that sort of way that veteran smokers can be – like all the moisture in his body had been absorbed by the cigarettes. I introduced myself, we shook hands, and then…he didn’t let go of my hand. I let my hand go limp so that it crumpled into a boney, bendy mass and tugged back to indicate that it was time to let go. Don thought this was awesome – the same way dogs leap onto squeaky toys because they sound like dying animals. He also thought I was cute.

Don used my useless, squished hand to pull himself closer to me. He slurred, “where’s your husband?” And then he cuddled up beside me on the bench. He thought I was really cute. Don had been in the military and lived everywhere, including, he claimed, Chattanooga even though he couldn’t tell me anything about it. He had been single for the last four years after his partner had left him for a Filipino stripper. He thought I was cute though.

When my pseudo-pre-screen-get to know you date showed up, he was shorter than I had hoped, and very amused that by my new cuddle buddy who had draped his arm across my shoulders. He was absolutely no help, so I introduced them. Don took this as a sign that he’d been invited to stay for the duration, and while he told us about his credit problems, I lit a cigarette.

“A’cuse me,” a voice said. I looked up to see that another, very drunk gentleman had wondered over. “C’aa, I borrow y’ lighter, cutie.” Drunker than Don, this guy placed himself in the middle of our awkward threesome and couldn’t stand still long enough for me to light his cigarette. We’ll call him Ron. Ron was from…somewhere. He slurred so bad that it might have been “Iowa”, “Ohio”, “Idaho” or “I don’t remember.” Ron was about Don’s age and similar in build, but paler, taller and more moisturized. Ron did something, which might have been unemployment. Ron had also lived everywhere. So, the first half-hour of my pseudo, pre-screen date was spent being mostly entertained and somewhat inappropriately touched by two possibly vagrant drunkards. Let’s be clear, they wanted nothing to do with my date; he was sort of being pushed out of the circle.

Finally, I asked Ron, “have you met my friend, Don? I think y’all grew up near each other.” Surprised and excited, one with his hand on my thigh, one with his hand on my shoulder, they began to speak a native alcoholic dialect that my date, and I couldn’t understand. I interrupted only once to ask Don and Ron what they’d like to drink. And then I grabbed my date and “went to buy the next round.” Later, we watched Ron and Don stumble out of the bar together, and somewhere, an alcoholic cupid got its wings.

To be fair, I’m southern, raised in a family full of preachers and preacher’s kids. I’ll talk to just about anybody, hear them out on a lot of things. I'll give anyone atleast one chance, but sometimes, my patience is long...sometimes, it's just not.

So, what does all this have to do with quitting the internet?
Well, yesterday, I headed out to the coffee shop for a few minutes to unwind before class. I thought an iced tea and the crossword puzzle would do wonders for my mood after work. This particular coffee shop has a bench with two-top tables in front. Being San Francisco though, the tables are no more than three inches apart, so if you need to get in and out, you either have to move the whole table, or scooch out the side.

I like the aisle seat, so I took the end table fully prepared to move should someone want the vacant table next to me. And a few minutes later, I glance up to see this guy looking at me and then at the blank spot next to me, then at me and back to the blank spot. This should have been a warning sign. It’s one of my pet peeves at work. I think it’s rude and kind of pathetic to go stand in front of someone’s desk until they acknowledge you.

So after a day of people standing in front of my desk like children who need to go to the bathroom, this guy at the coffee shop comes and stands in front of my table because apparently, getting into that empty seat is somewhere close to an algebra problem. But, I’m here to relax, so I stand up, move my crap and get out of the benching area.

“Are you leaving,” he asks, and that’s when I notice that there are numerous other open tables that don’t require this much brain power to get into.

I should have left.

Or moved.

But I just wanted to sit down and drink my tea and read the paper and do the crossword puzzle. So, I pointed to the empty seat and sighed, “Get in.”

Is this the point where I tell you that this guy was sweating…a lot…and not from any physical exertion? Or that he was wearing cologne? Or that despite the cologne, he smelled a little like ham? Or that he had Dungeon Master written all over him?

I will tell you that he sat down. And I sat down. And he slid over towards me immediately until his leg touched mine. “Hi, I’m Todd,” he said. I shook his sweaty meat paw, introduced myself back and slid away, turning my attention back to my paper.

Todd didn’t move. Instead, he looked onto my paper (he had his own spread out on the table), and occasionally, he glanced up at my face with a big, drippy grin. Then my paper, then my face – doing a pee-pee-pay attention to me dance. So I looked at him, in the eye and waited, eyebrows cocked, expectant that Todd would have something to say. He didn’t. Instead, he looked over at his own paper, a neck craning exercise considering how far away it was.

I flipped the page, found an article about unexploded bombs shutting down lobster fishing in a certain part of Maine. I thought that was funny, so I started drawing heavy lines around it with my ink pen until the paper began to give out. Yes, that’s right – I used an ink pen to cut an article out of the paper. Apparently to Todd, I had just performed a magic trick.

“Wow, I’ve never seen anyone do that. You just draw around the article until it comes out of the page?”

Yep Todd, just like that. Here’s your helmet.

Then, he waited. Like I was about to pull a rabbit from my ass….just for him. I scooted to the end of the bench, pulled my table with me and flipped to the puzzle section.

I was thankful when he didn’t follow. I relaxed a little and started poking around the crossword puzzle. I got really excited when I remembered “WKRP in Cincinnati” for one of the clues. I was doing pretty good, sipping my tea, proud that after years of slacking off, I still knew my way around a Wednesday (don’t laugh) crossword. Twenty or so minutes passed.

I checked my clock, decided it was time to leave for class and folded up my paper. Next to me, suddenly, Todd rattled and rustled and looked back at me.

“I beat you!”

His eyes gleamed, and he wiped his forehead with the back of his hand. It dripped onto the paper. I looked down and saw that his crossword puzzle was done.

That you did, Todd…That you did.

antiochlogan@yahoo.com