This was it.
I wondered for years what the best day of my life would be. I knew it would involve a girl. But how would I get there? Even a few months ago, I was at Zero. Zilch. Nada. Had practically nothing going in that department, or otherwise socially.
So my 8,768th day on Earth turned out to be better than any preceding it.
I went on my first third-date. Actually, I've only been on one second-date, so that means I had success on the very first try with the second-date.
As regular readers will recall, I was determined to kiss my date on that second-date, but didn't manage to do it. The result? Enormous frustration.
So in the several days between this third-date being arranged and actually going on it, I was extremely determined to have my first kiss this time. I put 2 or 3 kinds of chapstick on every night, to make sure that my lips would be in good shape when the day finally arrived. I burned my lip on a hotdog the night before, and immediately started googling up lip burns to find out the best thing to do. I was determined to not let anything interfere with this. I fended off the common cold with diligent use of multiple Zicam products.
And so, the day finally came. I'd been checking my cell phone periodically, each time hoping that the date hadn't been cancelled. It was set for 8 o'clock tonight. At around 5, I checked again. A new voice message.....from my date. Oh no! I listened to the message.
She said she was sorry to tell me so late, but she just realized that she had a choir practice tonight, but we could have dinner Friday instead.
Oh no! Another week. I hung up. I stared at the ceiling in dismay for a moment, then pressed clear on the cell phone. Another new voice mail. Maybe she had uncancelled?! I checked, and yes, she said it turned out the practice was actually next Saturday, so we could indeed go out tonight. And she said that was good. Yes!
So I prepared. Lots of preparation time, for a guy, but that's me.
I headed out about an hour early. This is interesting: my date only thought that I was taking her to dinner. I thought dinner alone would be pretty basic and unoriginal, so I spent hours in the days before researching restaurants and other things that would make good dates.
What had I come up with? I was going to take her to a psychic. Damn, I was good! That was guaranteed to awesome. Completely original, surely no guy had ever done this with her.
So I went by the psychic's place ahead of time without her. I didn't want her to see me paying $75 for a ridiculous service that was supposed to be 45 minutes to an hour per person. I knew it was a bad idea to pay a psychic ahead of time. They're generally shady people, in my view. But yeah, I didn't want her to know the price, so I'd risk the psychic lady jipping me.
I had extra time, so I made practice runs between my date's apartment building, the psychic's house, and the restaurant I'd researched and chosen.
Finally, I picked up my date. It was on! As usual, I had a few backup conversation topics in mind. I started with one of the 3 things she had mentioned that she was doing over the weekend. Apartment hunting, choir, and habitat for humanity. (Yep, I decided: screw it. I'll put some details in, maybe it'll be more interesting for anyone who reads this. If any of my dates come across the blog and bust me, it'll be an amazing coincidence).
One of those was enough to keep her talking until we got to the psychic's house. She had no idea.
I said, "I actually planned another activity before dinner."
Where are we going, she asked?
"Have you ever been to a psychic?"
"Oh, haha, you're crazy!"
Yep. This was an outstanding idea.
She had her tarot card reading first. The psychic asked her things about herself, and told her things about herself. Interestingly, some of the stuff was spot on. But nevermind that for now.
The psychic quickly got her mentioning that her grandfather had cancer, her parents' marriage was imperfect, and that she, my date, was happy on the outside, but sad on the inside. (This was "read" from the tarot cards, and confirmed by my date.)
What?! Okay...date conversation is supposed to be light and funny. This was neither!! Interesting, but a little worrisome. The reading only lasted about 10 minutes though, so it was okay. (Except for the fact that the psychic was ripping me off. $75 for two 10-minute readings?!)
The psychic started talking about my date's sleeping habits, which prompted her to mention some weird dreams she'd had. Excellent, a good topic for later! It's actually listed (thanks to Reese) in the Conversation Topics entry, but now I knew it was perfect for this person.
The other interesting part of my date's reading came when the psychic asked more about me. She asked if we were friends.
Were we friends? Good question. The moment of truth. Was I in unknowingly in a friends zone already? Probably not, but would my date be comfortable enough to be straight about this with the psychic?
Yes. She said, "No, actually, we met on eHarmony."
The psychic asked if it was our first time together.
"No, it's our...third date."
Yes! This was clearly a romantic relationship. No friends zone.
The psychic said we got along well, and had things in common, yada yada, some positive words.
My turn. The psychic asked if I was nervous. Actually, I was - very much so. But I was on a date, so I calmly replied "No...." She then said I was very relaxed, or something to that effect. BS, but it made me look good for my date.
The psychic impressed me slightly by correctly determining that I was working with computers, and then, without me giving any hints, that it was in engineering. Freaky! I could be an IT guy or anything else. She also said that I had been spending a lot of money, lots of places, here and there. True, but probably inferred from the ridiculous amount I was paying her. And she said that relationships come and go with me - sort of true, considering this was one of five girls I've been out with since starting the blog recently. But... the validity (or lack thereof) of psychics.... I won't dwell on it in this little book of a blog entry. It suffices to say that it makes for a kickass date.
She also said that I liked my date a lot. Yep...this girl's been growing on me. It doesn't help though for the psychic to point it out, so I was a little uncomfortable.
At any rate, I used the psychic session as a prime opportunity to put out some of my humor. Yep, I'm comfortable enough to do it now. I've been following the two simple things I spoke about in the Inhibition post, and so far, they've worked wonders every time. It's getting easier, and I don't even have to think about executing those two concepts.
She said I was getting something in the mail soon... I said, "That happens every day!" Haha, my date laughed. I was doing well.
So it ended with the psychic telling us not to rush into things, and that she hoped it worked out for us, positive stuff like that. Goodness. Having had so little social experience in life up to the creation of this blog, this was a lot of fun, and makes me feel really happy to even think about.
On to the restaurant! Unlike at the first date I went on, this time I had done my research, and knew to pull out chairs, open the car door, etc. Nailed those things, except that a little awkwardness occurred with the chair at the restaurant, and my date apologized for not letting me pull it out.
I ordered a large white pizza, she ordered ravioli. I told her I was going to go wash my hands real quick. When I was walking back, she happened to be looking behind her. Sure what this meant, I was not. The food was already on the table when I got back....crazy fast. I had nothing but a plate with a ridiculously large number of slices of white pizza. The taste? Oily, and horrible! Way besides the point though.
The conversation was as usual (girl doing 90% of the talking). Unfortunately, my voice was messed up, like it was on most of my dates. I had a few negative passing thoughts early on, mainly because of that. But things got better.
I was able to easily make a few humorous comments about some of the things my date said. Really simple, basic, yet effective skill, as long as you listen. It was fun! She agreed to dessert. Even after we finished that, we were still taking, and there was plenty of laughter.
Things were going so well that I got a little distracted internally, and started thinking of some other things while my date was talking.
I was thinking about that kiss. I was thinking about the research that I had done on first kisses. I remembered the phrase from a web site, "cup her beautiful face in your hands..."
And that was it. I started thinking, this girl is beautiful. She was. There was no doubt anymore; I liked this girl A LOT. I had thoughts to the effect of, I can't imagine how I'll find another girl this pretty. Oh man. Probably not good. Knowing that this was going well enough to justify the kiss (I was planning to go for it, justification or not), I started getting a little...nervous. Not anxious, but a little nervous. I felt a little jitter in my left jaw, not as bad as the infamous Twitch, but a little something for sure. That was okay...I hoped to calm down soon, and I did.
I was doing a little planning. I hadn't gotten a chance to turn the conversation to the dreams topic yet, so...I figured I would save it for later. That way I would definitely have something light and funny to talk about before going for that kiss at the end of the night.
But for now, I was enjoying the conversation, and continuing to hone my skills. She was talking about her job, and I saw a way to relate it to something else from the Conversation Topics blog entry. Winning the lottery! If you didn't have to do your job anymore - say, if you won the lottery - would you still do it just for fun?
That was it. Cha-ching! It turned out to be the greatest conversation starter ever. She had all kinds of ideas for what she'd do if she won the lottery. She told me some personal things, like exactly how much she gets paid. Probably a good sign. And it led to other topics, like celebrities, etc. Perfect.
That got us to the end of dinner (they were closing down the restaurant anyway). She let me pay without offering. I loved that. To me, it's romantic for the girl to just let me pay. I appreciated it - and I really liked this girl.
Walking to the car, I tried to pop in some gum when she wasn't looking. I opened and closed the passenger door for her, then while walking around the other side, spat out the gum, hopefully without her noticing (!). No time for chapstick application yet.
She lived about 5 minutes away. I was still saving the Dreams conversation topic. I pulled out something else from the blog - tattoos. I related it to some kids she noticed playing around outside. I completely defied inhibition; no time for that. Without hesitating, I asked her if she and her friends did anything crazy when they were that age. She said...nope. I then pulled out my tattoo-lead-in, which I'd thought of days ago. I asked her if she went through a rebel streak when she was in school. Kinda humorous - good! She said some things, and I just said: "No tattoos?" That led to enough conversation to get her to her apartment, and near the end of this story.
This is where I failed the last time. Before, I wasn't expecting to drive so close to the building door, so I didn't know if it made sense to walk her up. This time, I was ready. I put the four-way flashers on without saying anything, and then told her I'd walk her up so that she could tell me about one of those weird dreams she's been having.
I went to open the door for her, but it was locked. She'd locked herself out (lets hope because she was so excited to be going out with yours truly), and had to buzz someone to let her in. While she was doing that, I had my hand in my pocket, hoping to sneak some chapstick. She kept turning around, but when she was talking to someone on the intercom, I quickly went for it. Cherry flavor, a quick application.
They buzzed her in, and I walked her up. We ascended on the elevator, and walked to her door.
This was it, folks.
Her roommate let her in. I immediately started thinking about the things that could go wrong. If the roommate came out and started talking, I wouldn't have the requisite privacy.
But my date helped me out.
I asked one of my usual humorous (probably not that funny, but when someone likes you romantically, they'll laugh at just about anything within reason) questions about her dream.
She said she would be right back - she was just going in to get her keys. She then came out to (presumably) say goodnight to me.
This was it.
Here's what I remember of the greatest moment of my life, and those preceding and following it:
She said, "Thanks for dinner."
She then made a motion to hug me. This is where I get hazy on the details.
I had a couple different, fleeting thoughts in the moment.
A hug? Nooo!!
I am going for the kiss. But I had also hoped she would hug me first; this eased the mechanics of me getting close enough to kiss her. Plus, I realized that I am thirteen inches taller than she is. She couldn't initiate a standing kiss even if she wanted to, so a hug is by no means a bad sign.
While hugging her (I can't remember how much I actually hugged her, but I don't think it was much), I crackled out, in the worst voice ever, "Alright, good seeing you again."
Now, I think I got about half of that out during the hug, and about half after the hug was somewhat over.
But I thought quickly on my feet. I knew weeks in advance that come hell or high water, this time I was going to kiss this girl.
Very hazy on the details here. I'm pretty sure I went with the (bold) approach of cupping her (beautiful!) face in my hand, and....I kissed her.
I was completely immersed in the moment. That was odd. It couldn't have lasted very long - afterwards I was thinking maybe I should have done it longer. But despite that, there was a moment where I thought, literally, "What's this feeling? Oh wait! I know what this is!!!!" I was kissing a girl!!
It happened so fast that even a minute afterwards I couldn't remember exactly what had transpired. I'm still not clear on the mechanics of initiating a kiss - but it definitely happened.
I do remember, for sure, that she smiled either before, during, or after the kiss. Or some combination of the three. Can't remember the exact detail, but I felt like she seemed happy. The kiss was squarely, and wonderfully on the lips, and it definitely felt like she wanted this to happen. It actually seems like she was making the majority of the actual motion - maybe I just had my lips idly in the right place. Who knows. And those lips of hers were so, so soft - I didn't know lips could be so soft! I later wondered if I had not put on enough chapstick. Eh...
Who knew one could have so many thoughts in a mere few moments of time? It felt like she was the one kissing me, and it was.....right.
Anyway. I know, I know - I couldn't have written a touchier, feelier description than that. I waited 12 years for those moments though, so why not?
After the kiss - I'm not sure who pulled away first, if anyone - I said, in a slightly better voice, "have a good night," and I walked to the elevator. As I descended to the lobby, I pumped my fist in victory.
Danger
I've replayed the kiss probably 100 times in my mind in the last few hours. Never quite to my satisfaction (in terms of remembering details), but I'm just gonna have to call it quits with that.
Frankly, I hope to kiss her again. She probably wanted me to kiss her as badly as I wanted to do it. And, especially with the face-cupping that I'm pretty sure I did, just going for it without asking or anything crazy was better than a lot of "normal" guys even manage.
Now, there's some danger here. Whatever this girl is doing on her side of the dating game, it's working. I like her A LOT. She's gotten me thinking very highly of her.
In our rebel conversation, she mentioned that she's dating a lot more now. I wondered if she was currently seeing anyone else, and hoped that if so, she would now stop. Pretty bad. (On the bright side, I must be comparing favorably to someone). She talked about moving in a year; I had a passing thought about possibly moving with her, if somehow we were still seeing each other then. Really bad. I also thought that I'd be proud to have people I know see me with this girl; Eh...not so bad.
I've fallen for girls in the past, and fallen hard (despite never even getting to or through a single conversation, in my pre-blog life). I became pretty much dysfunctional in those situations...that can't happen here. I've been dating in such high volume that I didn't expect to find myself this interested in anybody. But I am. And I have to be careful.
So I am going to fight off the urge to obsess over this any further. I'm going to play it cool. Will there even be a fourth date? My gut feeling says yes. Driving home, I kept thinking how amazing it was that I got this far doing as poorly as I have been doing. Although I've been doing better than ever overall, there's still that weird voice thing (which I may have figured out a few hours ago), plus....I'm still not quite myself. My real self is so awesome! If only this girl knew.
If there's another date, the above is actually good - no where to go but up! In case there isn't another date (due to my pre-kiss crackling voice?), I've already promised myself to be steadfast in not freaking out this time. I wouldn't have met the girl if not for the mission....and if I had already had everything together when I met her, then I wouldn't have been on the mission in the first place! So there's nothing to lose with these things, and everything to gain.
So I haven't achieved "Hero" status on the mission just yet. But tonight - the very last night of Summer 2007 - was one hell of a milestone.
I wondered for years what the best day of my life would be. I knew it would involve a girl. But how would I get there? Even a few months ago, I was at Zero. Zilch. Nada. Had practically nothing going in that department, or otherwise socially.
So my 8,768th day on Earth turned out to be better than any preceding it.
I went on my first third-date. Actually, I've only been on one second-date, so that means I had success on the very first try with the second-date.
As regular readers will recall, I was determined to kiss my date on that second-date, but didn't manage to do it. The result? Enormous frustration.
So in the several days between this third-date being arranged and actually going on it, I was extremely determined to have my first kiss this time. I put 2 or 3 kinds of chapstick on every night, to make sure that my lips would be in good shape when the day finally arrived. I burned my lip on a hotdog the night before, and immediately started googling up lip burns to find out the best thing to do. I was determined to not let anything interfere with this. I fended off the common cold with diligent use of multiple Zicam products.
And so, the day finally came. I'd been checking my cell phone periodically, each time hoping that the date hadn't been cancelled. It was set for 8 o'clock tonight. At around 5, I checked again. A new voice message.....from my date. Oh no! I listened to the message.
She said she was sorry to tell me so late, but she just realized that she had a choir practice tonight, but we could have dinner Friday instead.
Oh no! Another week. I hung up. I stared at the ceiling in dismay for a moment, then pressed clear on the cell phone. Another new voice mail. Maybe she had uncancelled?! I checked, and yes, she said it turned out the practice was actually next Saturday, so we could indeed go out tonight. And she said that was good. Yes!
So I prepared. Lots of preparation time, for a guy, but that's me.
I headed out about an hour early. This is interesting: my date only thought that I was taking her to dinner. I thought dinner alone would be pretty basic and unoriginal, so I spent hours in the days before researching restaurants and other things that would make good dates.
What had I come up with? I was going to take her to a psychic. Damn, I was good! That was guaranteed to awesome. Completely original, surely no guy had ever done this with her.
So I went by the psychic's place ahead of time without her. I didn't want her to see me paying $75 for a ridiculous service that was supposed to be 45 minutes to an hour per person. I knew it was a bad idea to pay a psychic ahead of time. They're generally shady people, in my view. But yeah, I didn't want her to know the price, so I'd risk the psychic lady jipping me.
I had extra time, so I made practice runs between my date's apartment building, the psychic's house, and the restaurant I'd researched and chosen.
Finally, I picked up my date. It was on! As usual, I had a few backup conversation topics in mind. I started with one of the 3 things she had mentioned that she was doing over the weekend. Apartment hunting, choir, and habitat for humanity. (Yep, I decided: screw it. I'll put some details in, maybe it'll be more interesting for anyone who reads this. If any of my dates come across the blog and bust me, it'll be an amazing coincidence).
One of those was enough to keep her talking until we got to the psychic's house. She had no idea.
I said, "I actually planned another activity before dinner."
Where are we going, she asked?
"Have you ever been to a psychic?"
"Oh, haha, you're crazy!"
Yep. This was an outstanding idea.
She had her tarot card reading first. The psychic asked her things about herself, and told her things about herself. Interestingly, some of the stuff was spot on. But nevermind that for now.
The psychic quickly got her mentioning that her grandfather had cancer, her parents' marriage was imperfect, and that she, my date, was happy on the outside, but sad on the inside. (This was "read" from the tarot cards, and confirmed by my date.)
What?! Okay...date conversation is supposed to be light and funny. This was neither!! Interesting, but a little worrisome. The reading only lasted about 10 minutes though, so it was okay. (Except for the fact that the psychic was ripping me off. $75 for two 10-minute readings?!)
The psychic started talking about my date's sleeping habits, which prompted her to mention some weird dreams she'd had. Excellent, a good topic for later! It's actually listed (thanks to Reese) in the Conversation Topics entry, but now I knew it was perfect for this person.
The other interesting part of my date's reading came when the psychic asked more about me. She asked if we were friends.
Were we friends? Good question. The moment of truth. Was I in unknowingly in a friends zone already? Probably not, but would my date be comfortable enough to be straight about this with the psychic?
Yes. She said, "No, actually, we met on eHarmony."
The psychic asked if it was our first time together.
"No, it's our...third date."
Yes! This was clearly a romantic relationship. No friends zone.
The psychic said we got along well, and had things in common, yada yada, some positive words.
My turn. The psychic asked if I was nervous. Actually, I was - very much so. But I was on a date, so I calmly replied "No...." She then said I was very relaxed, or something to that effect. BS, but it made me look good for my date.
The psychic impressed me slightly by correctly determining that I was working with computers, and then, without me giving any hints, that it was in engineering. Freaky! I could be an IT guy or anything else. She also said that I had been spending a lot of money, lots of places, here and there. True, but probably inferred from the ridiculous amount I was paying her. And she said that relationships come and go with me - sort of true, considering this was one of five girls I've been out with since starting the blog recently. But... the validity (or lack thereof) of psychics.... I won't dwell on it in this little book of a blog entry. It suffices to say that it makes for a kickass date.
She also said that I liked my date a lot. Yep...this girl's been growing on me. It doesn't help though for the psychic to point it out, so I was a little uncomfortable.
At any rate, I used the psychic session as a prime opportunity to put out some of my humor. Yep, I'm comfortable enough to do it now. I've been following the two simple things I spoke about in the Inhibition post, and so far, they've worked wonders every time. It's getting easier, and I don't even have to think about executing those two concepts.
She said I was getting something in the mail soon... I said, "That happens every day!" Haha, my date laughed. I was doing well.
So it ended with the psychic telling us not to rush into things, and that she hoped it worked out for us, positive stuff like that. Goodness. Having had so little social experience in life up to the creation of this blog, this was a lot of fun, and makes me feel really happy to even think about.
On to the restaurant! Unlike at the first date I went on, this time I had done my research, and knew to pull out chairs, open the car door, etc. Nailed those things, except that a little awkwardness occurred with the chair at the restaurant, and my date apologized for not letting me pull it out.
I ordered a large white pizza, she ordered ravioli. I told her I was going to go wash my hands real quick. When I was walking back, she happened to be looking behind her. Sure what this meant, I was not. The food was already on the table when I got back....crazy fast. I had nothing but a plate with a ridiculously large number of slices of white pizza. The taste? Oily, and horrible! Way besides the point though.
The conversation was as usual (girl doing 90% of the talking). Unfortunately, my voice was messed up, like it was on most of my dates. I had a few negative passing thoughts early on, mainly because of that. But things got better.
I was able to easily make a few humorous comments about some of the things my date said. Really simple, basic, yet effective skill, as long as you listen. It was fun! She agreed to dessert. Even after we finished that, we were still taking, and there was plenty of laughter.
Things were going so well that I got a little distracted internally, and started thinking of some other things while my date was talking.
I was thinking about that kiss. I was thinking about the research that I had done on first kisses. I remembered the phrase from a web site, "cup her beautiful face in your hands..."
And that was it. I started thinking, this girl is beautiful. She was. There was no doubt anymore; I liked this girl A LOT. I had thoughts to the effect of, I can't imagine how I'll find another girl this pretty. Oh man. Probably not good. Knowing that this was going well enough to justify the kiss (I was planning to go for it, justification or not), I started getting a little...nervous. Not anxious, but a little nervous. I felt a little jitter in my left jaw, not as bad as the infamous Twitch, but a little something for sure. That was okay...I hoped to calm down soon, and I did.
I was doing a little planning. I hadn't gotten a chance to turn the conversation to the dreams topic yet, so...I figured I would save it for later. That way I would definitely have something light and funny to talk about before going for that kiss at the end of the night.
But for now, I was enjoying the conversation, and continuing to hone my skills. She was talking about her job, and I saw a way to relate it to something else from the Conversation Topics blog entry. Winning the lottery! If you didn't have to do your job anymore - say, if you won the lottery - would you still do it just for fun?
That was it. Cha-ching! It turned out to be the greatest conversation starter ever. She had all kinds of ideas for what she'd do if she won the lottery. She told me some personal things, like exactly how much she gets paid. Probably a good sign. And it led to other topics, like celebrities, etc. Perfect.
That got us to the end of dinner (they were closing down the restaurant anyway). She let me pay without offering. I loved that. To me, it's romantic for the girl to just let me pay. I appreciated it - and I really liked this girl.
Walking to the car, I tried to pop in some gum when she wasn't looking. I opened and closed the passenger door for her, then while walking around the other side, spat out the gum, hopefully without her noticing (!). No time for chapstick application yet.
She lived about 5 minutes away. I was still saving the Dreams conversation topic. I pulled out something else from the blog - tattoos. I related it to some kids she noticed playing around outside. I completely defied inhibition; no time for that. Without hesitating, I asked her if she and her friends did anything crazy when they were that age. She said...nope. I then pulled out my tattoo-lead-in, which I'd thought of days ago. I asked her if she went through a rebel streak when she was in school. Kinda humorous - good! She said some things, and I just said: "No tattoos?" That led to enough conversation to get her to her apartment, and near the end of this story.
This is where I failed the last time. Before, I wasn't expecting to drive so close to the building door, so I didn't know if it made sense to walk her up. This time, I was ready. I put the four-way flashers on without saying anything, and then told her I'd walk her up so that she could tell me about one of those weird dreams she's been having.
I went to open the door for her, but it was locked. She'd locked herself out (lets hope because she was so excited to be going out with yours truly), and had to buzz someone to let her in. While she was doing that, I had my hand in my pocket, hoping to sneak some chapstick. She kept turning around, but when she was talking to someone on the intercom, I quickly went for it. Cherry flavor, a quick application.
They buzzed her in, and I walked her up. We ascended on the elevator, and walked to her door.
This was it, folks.
Her roommate let her in. I immediately started thinking about the things that could go wrong. If the roommate came out and started talking, I wouldn't have the requisite privacy.
But my date helped me out.
I asked one of my usual humorous (probably not that funny, but when someone likes you romantically, they'll laugh at just about anything within reason) questions about her dream.
She said she would be right back - she was just going in to get her keys. She then came out to (presumably) say goodnight to me.
This was it.
Here's what I remember of the greatest moment of my life, and those preceding and following it:
She said, "Thanks for dinner."
She then made a motion to hug me. This is where I get hazy on the details.
I had a couple different, fleeting thoughts in the moment.
A hug? Nooo!!
I am going for the kiss. But I had also hoped she would hug me first; this eased the mechanics of me getting close enough to kiss her. Plus, I realized that I am thirteen inches taller than she is. She couldn't initiate a standing kiss even if she wanted to, so a hug is by no means a bad sign.
While hugging her (I can't remember how much I actually hugged her, but I don't think it was much), I crackled out, in the worst voice ever, "Alright, good seeing you again."
Now, I think I got about half of that out during the hug, and about half after the hug was somewhat over.
But I thought quickly on my feet. I knew weeks in advance that come hell or high water, this time I was going to kiss this girl.
Very hazy on the details here. I'm pretty sure I went with the (bold) approach of cupping her (beautiful!) face in my hand, and....I kissed her.
I was completely immersed in the moment. That was odd. It couldn't have lasted very long - afterwards I was thinking maybe I should have done it longer. But despite that, there was a moment where I thought, literally, "What's this feeling? Oh wait! I know what this is!!!!" I was kissing a girl!!
It happened so fast that even a minute afterwards I couldn't remember exactly what had transpired. I'm still not clear on the mechanics of initiating a kiss - but it definitely happened.
I do remember, for sure, that she smiled either before, during, or after the kiss. Or some combination of the three. Can't remember the exact detail, but I felt like she seemed happy. The kiss was squarely, and wonderfully on the lips, and it definitely felt like she wanted this to happen. It actually seems like she was making the majority of the actual motion - maybe I just had my lips idly in the right place. Who knows. And those lips of hers were so, so soft - I didn't know lips could be so soft! I later wondered if I had not put on enough chapstick. Eh...
Who knew one could have so many thoughts in a mere few moments of time? It felt like she was the one kissing me, and it was.....right.
Anyway. I know, I know - I couldn't have written a touchier, feelier description than that. I waited 12 years for those moments though, so why not?
After the kiss - I'm not sure who pulled away first, if anyone - I said, in a slightly better voice, "have a good night," and I walked to the elevator. As I descended to the lobby, I pumped my fist in victory.
Danger
I've replayed the kiss probably 100 times in my mind in the last few hours. Never quite to my satisfaction (in terms of remembering details), but I'm just gonna have to call it quits with that.
Frankly, I hope to kiss her again. She probably wanted me to kiss her as badly as I wanted to do it. And, especially with the face-cupping that I'm pretty sure I did, just going for it without asking or anything crazy was better than a lot of "normal" guys even manage.
Now, there's some danger here. Whatever this girl is doing on her side of the dating game, it's working. I like her A LOT. She's gotten me thinking very highly of her.
In our rebel conversation, she mentioned that she's dating a lot more now. I wondered if she was currently seeing anyone else, and hoped that if so, she would now stop. Pretty bad. (On the bright side, I must be comparing favorably to someone). She talked about moving in a year; I had a passing thought about possibly moving with her, if somehow we were still seeing each other then. Really bad. I also thought that I'd be proud to have people I know see me with this girl; Eh...not so bad.
I've fallen for girls in the past, and fallen hard (despite never even getting to or through a single conversation, in my pre-blog life). I became pretty much dysfunctional in those situations...that can't happen here. I've been dating in such high volume that I didn't expect to find myself this interested in anybody. But I am. And I have to be careful.
So I am going to fight off the urge to obsess over this any further. I'm going to play it cool. Will there even be a fourth date? My gut feeling says yes. Driving home, I kept thinking how amazing it was that I got this far doing as poorly as I have been doing. Although I've been doing better than ever overall, there's still that weird voice thing (which I may have figured out a few hours ago), plus....I'm still not quite myself. My real self is so awesome! If only this girl knew.
If there's another date, the above is actually good - no where to go but up! In case there isn't another date (due to my pre-kiss crackling voice?), I've already promised myself to be steadfast in not freaking out this time. I wouldn't have met the girl if not for the mission....and if I had already had everything together when I met her, then I wouldn't have been on the mission in the first place! So there's nothing to lose with these things, and everything to gain.
Regardless, I am actually going to keep dating other girls in the meantime. I have to stick to the plan - socialize-as-much-as-possible - and dates are so far the easiest social situations for me to get myself into. Time to pile on, and build up those skills, and build up that comfort level. I'll figure out how to make some platonic friends, too; didn't manage to get anything going in my dance class.
So I haven't achieved "Hero" status on the mission just yet. But tonight - the very last night of Summer 2007 - was one hell of a milestone.
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