I’m not here to play a game

After getting her number, call only to make a date – do not attempt to chat with her yet. Before the first date is over, ask to see her again but do not expect to actually make plans. If she tells you to call her the next day, wait two days before calling her to make plans for a second date – again, do not attempt to chat; call only to make plans. The second date should be her choice, but preferably something that doesn’t allow the two of you much time alone together. Wait until after at least two dates before letting her know you’re interested in her. Then, if you seem too interested, she won’t be interested in you, or if you don’t seem interested enough, she’ll be insulted. Also be polite, but remember that if you are too polite or not polite enough she will not want to continue dating her. If you are able to keep up the exact level of apparent interest and civility that she is looking for for at least two or three weeks, you’re probably ‘dating’, but unless absolutely necessary don’t ask.

**********

WHAT!?!?!?

I suppose that under the right circumstances, with practice and training, I might be able to do something like this. I tend definitely to fall into the ‘overdoing it’ camp, though. I’m not sure I know how to ask someone for a phone number without letting her know I’m interested in her. It would be hard for me to have someone I was interested in getting to know on the line and not talk to them. It’s hard for me to believe that a relationship would work where after half a dozen dates when I thought (or verified) that I was dating someone exclusively, I suddenly began to show them my actual level of interest in and attraction to them which I had been falsely representing for the first several weeks; am I supposed to keep pretending I’m not as interested as I am, and if so, for how long? How is this healthy?

I AM a smothering person. Am I missing something here? Am I supposed to be someone other than myself indefinitely, or is there some magical point where I’m allowed to start behaving the way I naturally do?

I am handicapped though, by my life’s circumstances. I don’t typically leave the property in Pine (except to get the mail) five times in two or three weeks. I don’t have a real income source to ‘pay for everything’ on dates. I don’t have ready transportation to even meet for dates.

…Erg…

The whole thing must be an improbable dream I have, with no connection to the reality I’m living. Some of it could have been possible in the years in between, when I was living in the middle of an urban center, earning money… but even then I didn’t really have much in the way of transportation. I think … probably if it had occurred to me how important a connection people seem to make between one’s vehicular availability and whether or not they will even consider someone romanticly … if I had known how the cost of a car and gas and maintenance and insurance and all that goes with that related to my ability to begin and maintain relationships … I might have wanted a car at 16 like everyone else. Something about it … didn’t make sense to me … mostly still doesn’t … that people tend to decide not to bother getting to know people who use means of transportation alternate to personally owned motor vehicles.

(Or people who are interested in them, for that matter…)

Are these the ‘valuable skills’ I never picked up? Dishonesty and misrepresentation and guessing games? Should I just go get that book on ‘the rules‘ and memorize it, even though it goes against what my heart and mind tell me is right? Why can’t I tell someone I’m interested in that I’m interested in them? Why can’t I open up to someone about who I am and where I’ve been and how I feel and what I want without violating some imagined boundary? Without upsetting or offending or scaring off somebody? Not because something I am or somewhere I’ve been or something I’ve felt was scary, offending, or upsetting, but the fact that I was honest and open about it was.

***

I’m sorry. I’m just frustrated. Maybe that’s why I never ‘let myself’ experience the ‘dating scene’ for very long … it seems like the ‘scene’ isn’t about healthy human interaction but manipulation, dishonesty, and games-playing. I just want intimacy, companionship, and happiness in an open, honest environment. I’m not desperate, I’m just interested. Actually, just having looked up desperate at dictionary.com, I am ‘extremely intense’, definition number seven. I don’t know. I’m getting sleepy. My head aches. I don’t want to face a world where I have to play mind games to reach companionship.

Why doesn’t the rest of the world believe in honesty?

Published by

Teel

Author, artist, romantic, insomniac, exorcist, creative visionary, lover, and all-around-crazy-person.

14 thoughts on “I’m not here to play a game”

  1. Because that would be no fun Teel, and by fun I mean definition number 13 which entails “what cats have when they toy with living prey before dispatching and feeding on them”. Chin up, little fella, it doesn’t get any better than this.

  2. Because that would be no fun Teel, and by fun I mean definition number 13 which entails “what cats have when they toy with living prey before dispatching and feeding on them”. Chin up, little fella, it doesn’t get any better than this.

  3. SHAVE!!!!CLEAN UP A LITTLE AND IT MIGHT HELP IN THE DATING SCENE AND A CALL BACK.

  4. SHAVE!!!!CLEAN UP A LITTLE AND IT MIGHT HELP IN THE DATING SCENE AND A CALL BACK.

  5. You’re silly. I’ve had the beard for less than 100 days & haven’t tried dating in over 8 months. I’ve only had a beard-like growth once before, and that was… for about 100 days from the end of september 2001 until near the end of that year… I think there’s a post about my shaving it off…

    Right now I live up ‘in the mountains’ and as I’ve said rarely leave the property I live on more than once a week. There isn’t really a dating scene in a town with a population as low as Pine, AZ, anyway.

    Mostly I’m just frustrated by the ridiculous way one is expected to behave in the ‘dating scene’… and as a matter of fact, having to meet some physical profile for appearance is included in the ridiculousness. I feel that I should be allowed to look like myself, since I’d want someone who could accept me looking like I want to look instead of someone who would be upset by a beard if I suddenly decided to grow one weeks or months (or years) into a relationship. I don’t want to have to pretend to be something I’m not to get a ‘call back’. I don’t believe I’d find someone who liked me for me – they’d like the person i was pretending to be, instead, and they don’t exist. How is that good for anyone?

    Anyway, I found copies of The Rules and The Rules II used online for a total of $0.81 (plus ~$6.50 S&H), and they should meet me when I get home to Pine. I’ll study them, and if I decide to try to find a dating scene, I’ll be ready.

  6. You’re silly. I’ve had the beard for less than 100 days & haven’t tried dating in over 8 months. I’ve only had a beard-like growth once before, and that was… for about 100 days from the end of september 2001 until near the end of that year… I think there’s a post about my shaving it off…

    Right now I live up ‘in the mountains’ and as I’ve said rarely leave the property I live on more than once a week. There isn’t really a dating scene in a town with a population as low as Pine, AZ, anyway.

    Mostly I’m just frustrated by the ridiculous way one is expected to behave in the ‘dating scene’… and as a matter of fact, having to meet some physical profile for appearance is included in the ridiculousness. I feel that I should be allowed to look like myself, since I’d want someone who could accept me looking like I want to look instead of someone who would be upset by a beard if I suddenly decided to grow one weeks or months (or years) into a relationship. I don’t want to have to pretend to be something I’m not to get a ‘call back’. I don’t believe I’d find someone who liked me for me – they’d like the person i was pretending to be, instead, and they don’t exist. How is that good for anyone?

    Anyway, I found copies of The Rules and The Rules II used online for a total of $0.81 (plus ~$6.50 S&H), and they should meet me when I get home to Pine. I’ll study them, and if I decide to try to find a dating scene, I’ll be ready.

  7. On topic:

    “A recent study revealed that people’s perceptions of their own abilities often had little impact on their performance. However, the people in the study were less likely to try activities for which they had wrongly assumed they had no aptitude, researchers noted.”

    -Today’s RealAge Tip of the Day

  8. On topic:

    “A recent study revealed that people’s perceptions of their own abilities often had little impact on their performance. However, the people in the study were less likely to try activities for which they had wrongly assumed they had no aptitude, researchers noted.”

    -Today’s RealAge Tip of the Day

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