Blind Dates

Today at work I had a sudden recollection of a blind date I went on a while ago. 
The opportunity presented itself to me in a message sent from a friend on Facebook.  Oh Facebook...it has introduced so many wonderful and terrible things into my life, blind dating being the latter. 

Anyway, she sent me this cryptic message simply saying, "Do you trust me?"  (By the way, if anyone ever asks you that, it's probably best to opt with "No, what do you want?".)  I replied naively with, "Of course!  What do you need?"  Honestly, I do trust and respect this woman so it wasn't a stretch for me to reply in that manner;  I was, however, surprised by her answer.

She told me she knew a guy who was a friend of her son's who had been looking for a relationship for a long time.  He had a good job, had his own place, was easy going and friendly...he seemed like a great person on paper.  She said that he was a bit shy and had been talking to them about how he was struggling to find someone he could connect with.  Suddenly, during their conversation, she was struck with enlightment!  In her mind she matched us up but at least had the courtesy to message me first on Facebook and ask if it would be okay so arrange a date.

I was a bit kerflummoxed by the message.  First off, I had just started to lose weight and become somewhat comfortable with how I looked, so it seemed a bit outrageous that anyone would consider me as possible girlfriend material.  Secondly, how well do these people really know?  They saw an aspect of me at church but Marcia as a whole person?  The girl who would go to the gym at 2 a.m. and run on the treadmill because she couldn't sleep and was lonely?  The girl who lived on chickpeas and tuna?   The girl who struggled to look at herself in the mirror? 

Did this friend really know me well enough off to arrange a match for me?  I'll admit though, I was somewhat excited.  The prospect around me were minimal...the guy pool at church has shrunk to...well...zero... I had the song "Matchmaker Matchmaker" run through my head on a loop and I envisioned what this guy might look like.  Tall?  Handsome?  Smart?  Funny?  There were so many possibilities! 

In my heart, I knew it wasn't the right time for a blind date.  I had fallen in love with someone else and I suppose in a way, I was pining for him.  As I ran on that treadmill, I imagined myself with this guy I had fallen for, because obviously he was the perfect guy for me and hopefully, eventually he had to come to his sense and realize that was the truth as well.  But in the meantime, I figured going on a blind date wouldn't hurt and who knows?  It would be best to leave all the options open... 


So here's what went down:  I agreed to the date, my friend sent him details about me and he was interested, so off we went.  My friend and her husband agreed to come along so we  wouldn't be left alone and they decided mini-golfing would be fun.  Let me add here that I don't really care for organized games such as bowling, mini-golfing, darts etc, but I went along with it gamely and rode with them in their car to the course. 

The first thing was that I wasn't attracted to him.  He wasn't ugly or hideous to any extent, but I wasn't drawn to him.  I have been sexually and physically attracted to people that aren't the standard good looking guys, but right off the cuff I knew I wasn't attracted to him at all.  However, I decided to give it a shot, smile and talked and we played our way through the course.  In retrospect, I enjoyed the mini-golfing aspect of the night which wasn't saying much.


He hardly said anything to me the whole time.  Perhaps he was so shy that he couldn't speak to me directly, but he made jokes with the husband and talked to my friend, ignored me the whole time except for a few words here and there.  The fortunate part was that the mini-golf kept us busy and the awkwardness was held at bay until we went to a Tim Hortons after and were forced to make conversation.  I asked all the leading questions in order to keep it flowing and he sat and played on his iPhone the entire time.  In fact, he decided it would be great to show us every single "cool" app that he had downloaded and was enthralled with fake lighter app that apparently is handy when you're at concerts.


It wasn't so much humiliating as a life lesson:  don't let people who aren't completely familiar with you attempt to match you up with someone.  I am glad that I went because I learned what I wanted from a significant other:  someone who isn't self-involved and has zero sense of humour.  I would never have considered those qualities necessary until I was put in above detailed situation.  Ahh, life is funny.  And by the way, I got over the guy that I had been pining for and completely forgot about the blind date during that time of healing.  I suppose the only reason the blind date came to mind was because when I was surfing apps on my android, I stumbled across a lighter app and the entire story was brought to mind... 


I'm also proud that I can look back and say, "I have been on a blind date".  How many people have done such an exciting and interesting thing?  There's this little saying on the side of the Lulu Lemon bags that says something like, "Do one thing everyday that frightens you" or something along those lines.  And I did.