The shame.
Hands down, it is in the top 5 most embarrassing moments of my life. I said I didn’t want to go on the Apps for this exact reason; the high potential for embarrassment and my propensity for deep shame. Yet, in the spirit of the moment, and in good-will to my friend, I signed up to Bumble and Hinge for one week only on holiday in New York.
My friend, completely transparent on the matter, thought that if I got on the Apps there was a chance I might fall in love and move to New York. Surprisingly this is a friend of some 18 years, she should have known better but bless her for trying.
She gave assistance building the profiles because my vocabulary for these things is limited and I find it difficult to make myself sound approachable in one sentence or less. Apparently, the aim of the game is not to be acerbic and snooty; my Resting Bitch Attitude is not appropriate here.
In line with my theory that I am only attractive to the under 30’s, over 70’s and married men, I soon had a conversation going with a man whom I later discovered was only 26. Not being familiar with the workings of the Apps I wasn’t 100% how to check this prior to chatting or to check boxes that took this age group out of my potential matches, it was a rookie mistake.
He is humourous and witty and, surprisingly as he is American, I only had to explain one thing to him which was the word ‘wanker’. Outside of this, he got my jokes and if he didn’t, he certainly covered it up really well. He doesn’t live in New York; he’s just working there remotely for the week and wants to meet up but can’t in the evenings for some reason and could we meet in the day for a coffee or a walk?
In the day? A date in the daylight? A first date in the day light with coffee? Really? Who does that? Is that like a new millennial thing? Hold on… I’m not sure he’s even a millennial, is he too young to be a millennial…?
He tells me where he is staying and stupidly, I tell my friend. We end up at Nordstrom my friend and I, the following day, and as a side note, I buy a pair of orange Birkenstocks for the next leg of my holiday to Sri Lanka. The high point of this story.
Nordstrom is right near where he is staying and under duress, I let him know I’m there and tell him I’m in ladies shoes on the 2nd floor. Shortly after, he messages to say he’s in men’s coats on the 1st floor, I reply that I’m in the café on the lower ground. This annoying back and forth comes to end on the ground floor in perfume and cosmetics.
We meet, we hug, we walk from the store to Central Park. My friend waits in the café on the lower ground, this will be no more than 45 minutes as he has a meeting he needs to get back for.
I do my usual prattling on about myself for a bit in a humorous anecdotal style and then when it gets to the point of running low on content I try and push the conversation onto him. During our earlier messaging he had told me that he works on ‘moon landing cars’, I obviously think this is bullshit and tease him mercilessly; I may be new to the Apps but I can smell bullshit when someone claims to be a rocket scientist a mile off. As it turns out, with a touch of sleuthing, it happens to be true, he really does build space cars.
So, we’re walking and I think of only two things I know about space given I’ve not watched any Star Wars movies and Apollo 11 came out ages ago and is a bit of a foggy memory. I therefore ask the obvious question; how do you feel about excessive amounts of money being spent on moon landings and space exploration when children are starving on Planet Earth? Followed by; did you have space man bed sheets as a child? I thought I best lighten the tone realising my question was a little bit antagonistic. I then have a bingo moment when I recall a BBC article I had read the week previous; so how do you think we could clean up all the mountains of space junk orbiting the earth?
This was a touch of genius, thank you to the BBC, turns out he’d written a thesis on it. Can’t tell you what the answer was though, needless to say it wasn’t as straightforward as it might seem.
We do a short circuit in the park and head back to Nordstrom which it transpires has many more entrances and exits than I had first realised.
We find our way back to perfume and cosmetics on the ground floor to say our goodbyes and he goes in for the hug, all very nice but then my goodness is it lingering! My thoughts start racing, I’m still holding a takeaway coffee, it’s very brightly lit in here, it’s the day time… shit I think he is going to kiss me.
I’m thinking fast and thinking how can I make this stop and him go away and for some strange reason I settle on kissing him, take the bull by the horns as it were and get this over with. Holding a coffee, in the day time under bright lights I go for it. And I miss. And then he goes for it and he misses. I want to die. We both stand there staring at the floor and he says ‘that was dreadful’ and I say ‘yes, please go away now’. I then literally push him in the chest and I scarper.
But, in a moment of clarity I realise that if I walk back to the escalator to get to the café on the lower ground I have to walk between two store exits and I don’t know which way he is going because I can’t bear to look up in my absolute shame so I duck in behind Elizabeth Arden and hide. I’m standing in the bright redness of Elizabeth Arden, which is no doubt complimenting the colour of my face, hiding out when he comes around the aisle to find me!
He looks at me and says ‘we can’t leave it like that, it was too awful, please may I kiss you?’ My insides curl up, I am so obviously hiding, I look like such an idiot and I say ‘Sure but make it quick’. There’s a kiss which is average because I have coffee breath and the lights are bright and I’m dying inside and then I tell him to ‘go away now’. And this time I run first for the escalator and don’t look back.
I find my friend who’s two-year-old boy has become very attached to a fluffy pink unicorn-esq child size, pull along suitcase and tell her what’s happened. She helpfully says ‘somewhere in this building a security guard has just wet himself laughing watching that.’
We go back to her place and her husband pops some music on; Elton John’s Rocket Man.
At least I got some cheap Birkenstocks.
