Fatigue

Well, I don't have any good news to report, but I did say that I would post an update on Sunday - so here it is.

The date I tried to arrange didn't happen (darn e-mail; messages can get caught in internet limbo for days, but unfortunately I hadn't yet gotten a telephone number).

I should clarify my use of meetup.com. The skeet shooting event I went to was linked on meetup.com, but the organization and the site with all the good activities is called Professionals in the City (http://www.prosinthecity.com). They do events in and around 6 American cities.

The meetup was okay. There were 10 other people. I am 24 years old...all but 2 of the others were much older than I am. The other 2 were definitely somewhat older. I practiced the Inhibition-post strategy and initiated a little conversation (common ground: watching a football game) before the shindig started. That worked fine, but I really didn't do much. Then we had earplugs in, so that's my excuse for not putting forth much initiative to connect. I wanted to talk to the 2 younger people a little afterwards, but they were occupied talking to others, so I eventually gave up and left instead of waiting to try to make some conversation. Not great on my part!

Overall, it looks like Professionals in the City could be a good way to make friends though. Especially if you're in your 30's or 40's. Out of the 10 others, there were only 2 couples - the other 6 came alone.

Can you tell there isn't much enthusiasm in this post? I was really, really depressed yesterday about the apparent end of my fling (3 dates) with the girl who I started to like so much. I won't go into it, but it suffices to say my reaction was very bad. A perhaps extreme overreaction I admit, since I pointed out there's never anything to lose with this stuff, etc., etc. But I couldn't help it. I understand logic, but my heart does not.

Today is a little better. I'm still experiencing brief periods of despair, but yesterday was completely out of control. Now I'm just trying to be as productive as I can (rather than screwing up other aspects of my life), despite my low spirits, until time can heal my little wound.

For the sake of completeness, I should give an update on the sixth date I went on. That was my fifth first-date, and it was held between the second- and third- dates with the girl who's now causing me all the despair (Confused yet?). I told you afterwards that it went so well that I had no doubt there would be a second-date, if I wanted it. Well, my friends...I was wrong. Kinda. Here's the e-mail I got today, after pinging her with a "what's up?" on match.com:

Hey [My Name]! Sorry it took me so long to get back to you!! I hope things are going well. I wanted to let you know that I started seeing someone exclusively-but I hope you know that I had a really nice time with you and I really enjoyed your company. I hope match turns out well for you, and thanks for a really nice date-
[Her Name]

Sweet girl, huh? I appreciated that. The other girl I met on that site just ignored me completely after our date, so I found this to be quite tactful.

Like I keep saying: I don't mean to turn this into a blog, or a mission about dating! That's just one of the most accessible social resources, so don't worry - I am going to keep trying to figure out how to just make friends, too.

And so, this is proving to be a long, hard road. Harder than I thought - I didn't foresee the heartache of developing such strong feelings for someone after only three dates, and then having it all suddenly evaporate. It took over six weeks to get that far, so now am I a bit fatigued, and will likely have to take a little break from dating.

How long will this hard road be? It's been 81 days since I started the blog. It's going well enough that I hope to declare Mission Accomplished in 284 more days, making it an even year. A single year to make up for an 18-year deficit of social experience? Maybe it's a long shot, but that's all the more reason to try.

Making Friends and More Persistence

Well, it's been pretty quiet since my elated post almost a week ago. I just remembered that I should be doing something every single day, so that shouldn't have been the case.

I'm now pretty sure that I won't again see the girl that was the topic of the last blog entry (first third-date). I liked her a lot, but I called her a few days later, and got the impression that she is no longer interested (she didn't accept the fourth date I proposed; she said she would think about it and let me know, but I haven't heard from her in 3 days).

Really, including dating as a tool for gaining social experience can be quite dangerous. When you meet someone you really like, you become very vulnerable to the strongest of human emotions (or at least I do!). This is bad news since, frankly, the initial paucity of social skills and experience is likely to prevent you from getting as far as a relationship on the first several tries (an interesting observation is that some shy people are actually married! So there's always hope nevertheless). The last few days, I had a really tough time accepting that I probably wouldn't get to see this girl again. But I'm probably worse at dealing with those things than anyone. I'm doing pretty well so far today.

So yeah, I'm on the mend. One of the things I realized after countless hours of rumination about the last girl I dated was this: I want to get good at this stuff. Really good at it. If I ever meet Miss Right, I want to have a fair shot at her!

But I need to learn to walk before I can run. I still don't have any new friends - all of my platonics from craig's list dropped off. Probably because they were all female, and really had something more in mind than just friendship. Making male friends on craig's list just isn't workable, so...time for Plan B!

If I actually had a group of close friends, the mission would be darn near complete. So I need to start putting some serious effort into that.

So now I am trying meetup.com. I registered for a Professionals in the City meetup. It turns out, this site has a TON of super fun meetings! It sounds great, because regardless of how the social stuff goes, you'll at least have fun. My first event is skeet shooting. Great...kill three birds with one stone:

1) A new hobby, making me a more interesting person and giving me more things to talk about, and possibly do, with anyone.

2) Have fun

3) Hopefully make some new friends!

I am going to make a real effort to connect at this one. Certainly the other people going are also interested in making friends, since they're doing a meetup from the Internet. And the activity will provide plenty of conversation fodder. Plus, it will provide immediate common ground for meeting up with the same people more than once - perhaps regularly - and this is essential.

Sounds perfect! I will let you know how it goes on Sunday.

Plus, I made another first-date for Sunday, in order to keep honing my 1-on-1 skills. The things I've identified that I need to work on bigtime are:

1) Keeping my voice eloquent

2) Talking about myself smoothly

3) Telling stories (can't do this AT ALL yet!)


And skills I am good with and want to hone to mastery are:

1) Humor. I've been kicking butt getting past Inhibition with the last plan I described. Add a little more relaxation in the mix, and my natural humor should flow.

2) Keeping the conversation going with active listening and asking open-ended and other questions.

3) Having fun, interesting conversation topics. I will post some more stuff in the blog later that actually worked in practice. In fact, I will try to post everything that ever works in practice!

And so it continues. After 7 dates and 3 platonic meetings, I can say with certainty that I'm making progress. It's a long, sometimes hard road, but nothing could be more worthwhile.

There are enough readers that I should be meeting a couple of you at some meetup.com events, assuming that turns out to be a good tool! Talk to you later.

The Best Night of My Life

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.

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.

Clear Progress

Ok! I think that was the longest period of time I've gone without posting. Fear not, my friends, for the mission shall been seen through to completion.

So there was a one-week lull in the action that included some consternation on my part. I won't get into it; I will just advise that everyone getting involved in these things use the telephone and not e-mail whenever possible. As you know, I had terrible phone anxiety...so I tried to use e-mail whenever I could. E-mail and messages in general can lead to unnecessary misunderstandings. Plus, I should have been using the phone whenever possible in order to get more comfortable with it. So from now on, I am discontinuing use of e-mail whenever I get a person's telephone number. Well, for non-platonic things at least.

Anyway! I was back in action today. I went on my sixth date (ninth overall meeting!), and it was a first-date. As you can probably tell, I am happy.

I went into this date feeling as if I really have the first-date thing down. I can't imagine ever having another one-and-done, like the first three. I made mistakes in those early, practically sacrificial dates, and now I know what I'm doing.

So, as has become my policy, I made this first-date a "Starbucks date." The plan? Simple...aim to talk over drinks for 45 minutes at Starbucks. Have 5-6 topics in mind to discuss going in. Stick firmly to the two principles in the "Inhibition" post. End on a high note, go home, and don't obsess over it.

That was pretty much executed to perfection. Lucky for me, without exception, EVERY girl I have been out with has talked A LOT (90%+ of the conversation).

Now, it turns out that I am a heck of a good listener. It's the one conversation skill that I had going in, but I am going to to try to use this date as an example for others, to explain how I do it.

So I am clever. Instead of trying to pull out a ton of random questions from my Conversation Topics blog entry, I have a very simple roadmap of topics.

So between the personals profile, e-mail, and a brief phone conversation, I knew a little about my companion. I knew she worked with animals, I knew she had gone to Australia to research animals, I knew where she went to school...etc.

Me: So how was your day? (I knew she would mention work, to which I would be able to relate the topic of animals, which relates to her Australia trip, which relates to what she majored in at college, etc.)

Her: It was good. My job is interesting because we do something totally different every day.

Me: Oh yeah? What'd you do today? (I pulled an obvious question from her comment)

Her: We counted different species of reptiles in the reservoir. (These are actually longer, more detailed responses; remember, she is doing 90% of the talking)

Me: So have you ever had any pets like that? Reptiles and amphibians?

Her: Yeah, I had tree frogs. Haven't had any reptiles yet though. How about you? (This is one of the relatively few times she actually asked me a question. Simple stuff here: just answer it!)

Me: I've had mostly amphibians. I have a frog right now.

Her: What kind?

Me: It's an african-clawed frog. You know, Xenopus.... (I actually get a chance to talk about something now, because I've wittingly led the conversation into something I know about)

Her: Actually I don't know. Which one is that?

Me: It's one that only lives underwater.

Her: Oh ok, I think I've seen it in the pet store.

Me: Yeah, probably so.

Her: So you like herping? (She's referring to something I alluded to in our first few e-mails)

Me: Yeah. Well I haven't actually done it, but I'm interested in it.

Her: Yeah. They're actually not that easy to find. When we were in Australia we only found a few snakes. And a lot of frogs. (She brought up the Australia trip. I would have if she hadn't)

We then talked about her trip to Australia for 10 minutes or so. This isn't an exact transcript, but it's some of what I remember from the early part of the conversation. It basically continued like that. Mostly me asking questions (don't worry, it doesn't seem at all like an interview when you make occasional comments), plus she asked me something about a project I did in school, which I explained for a couple minutes. My questions eventually led to her talking at length about her career ambitions - that took up the most time.

Very simple stuff:

(1) Have a few topics in mind, and have in mind how they relate to each other, or to what may be said, and to what you know.

(2) Listen to the responses, and formulate new questions based on what is said.

(3) Listen to the responses, and make comments about things that relate to your own experiences whenever you notice that.

So I just tried to give you the flavor of one of these meetings, as requested by reader Jason. Hopefully that helps for anyone wanting to try this. Let me know if there are any questions!

It went well. I didn't pull any random jokes, because it didn't seem like it would fit in the conversation. But I made whatever slightly humorous comments that came to mind, without letting inhibition get in my way. And I was just myself, and didn't try to impress with any responses, so I didn't trip up on anything. I also didn't think much about it ahead of time, so I didn't let any type of anxiety build up going in. And finally, I didn't concern myself with the results before, during, or after the shindig.

Don't worry - after these things become tried and true, I will summarize for you everything that works, and perhaps everything that doesn't.

Conclusion

I ended it first (very important, for the guys), and she said it was nice meeting me, I said the same, and she thanked me twice for the coffee (cheap date!). She said have a good night; I said alright, you too .

There was plenty of smiling, and sufficient laughter (this is what happens when you get people to talk about the things they love in life), so I have absolutely no doubt that there will be a second date if I want it. Yes, if I want it.

Tonight I also achieved another milestone.

I made a date over the telephone. Pretty easy! Call until you get them (no messages), make 5 minutes of smalltalk (easy compared to the above date, which was 1 hour 20 minutes, by the way), make the date, and bam, you're done.

The date is set for this weekend with the girl I went out on my first second-date with. So yes, I am booked for my first third-date ever! Mutual interest is a very good and unique feeling. If you haven't experienced this, then you must! I'll help any way I can, throw questions at me. Anonymous comments now allowed.

Clear progress.

Sheer Success

Ok. That last post was ridiculous - I don't even want to read it. I can get kinda nutty, so bear with me :)

One thing I wrote a while ago was that it's important to not obsess over these social interactions after trying them. Well, last time I managed to do the exact opposite! It actually takes a lot of willpower for me to avoid that, because I have OCD. Oh well..that just means that if (in the future) I can avoid dwelling on things in the aftermath, anyone can (I think it's somewhat normal to dwell on such things a bit when you're so new to them).

Alright....so as you can see, I've gotten pretty interested in the whole dating game. Not a bad thing, because if I can handle those social situations, I'll be in pretty good shape overall. I'm mainly focusing on that now though out of necessity. Both of my platonic friends seem to be history now.

What happened to them? Well, one of the girls sent me an e-mail asking if I had fun "when we went out." I then decided that I couldn't let it go any further without pointing out that we were strictly friends (I met her on the craig's list "strictly platonic" section; as we've learned, most of the people on there have something else in mind. Ay-yi-yi!). So I very gently indicated as much, telling her that I was already dating someone. It's been a week, no response. And the other girl just seemed to drop off; over a week, no response. Maybe she's just busy, who knows.

Okay....so what's with the title of this entry, you ask? Well, yesterday I cut down on the dwelling a bit, but I was still wondering about the outcome of that first second-date. I knew that overall it went very very well, but I had been ridiculously focusing on the last, ambiguous minute of the 5-hour date.

I'd planned to call her today and ask her out again....find out once and for all how it went. Had a little anxiety about that. I got a pleasant surprise when I checked my e-mail today, though: she had contacted me for the follow-up! Yep....she thanked me for taking her out, said she'd really had a good time, and told me to let her know how my week goes.

Awesome, it's a really good feeling for the girl to initiate the follow-up, because (apparently) that rarely happens. And it means that I completely conquered one of the most difficult date scenarios I could imagine.

So I did all of that worrying for nothing. Ridiculous! From now on I'm going to focus immensely on playing it cool, not worrying, not obsessing over these things. That's an important "skill" to have going forward, and it's one that I can improve every time, regardless of how the actual interactions go.

I'm starting to line up other dates as well. Those should help to evaluate the effectiveness of "Inhibition Solution Theory #2." But I don't intend to neglect the platonic stuff altogether. We're long overdo for a post about approaching people and striking up conversation out in the wild, without the internet to help us. I'll get on it :-)

Success Clouded by Frustration

I am pretty sure that I am the most frustrated human being on the planet right now. My head feels like it's going to explode! I don't know what to do, so I will write a blog entry. I'm probably just going to ramble, so you've been warned.....

Tonight I went out on my first second-date ever. I was quite anxious in the days leading up to this one, all the way until the time I got in the car to head out for it.

In particular, one thing I was anxious about was picking up my date. I had never driven anywhere with a girl, and it's probably been over a year since I've driven with anyone, even family, in the car. I am a pretty good driver, but I was afraid of something embarrassing happening on the road...anything, like someone blowing their horn at me, or stopping suddenly...anything. I kept worrying about little things being awkward, like putting my hand behind the passenger seat when backing up. Plus, this date's venue was in a downtown area of a city, and I knew that was the one area where I'd had some trouble driving, even alone. Plus, I didn't know the way, so I would be following my navigation system, and figured I might screw up some things with that too. And should I have the radio on? If so, what volume level? Ahhh!

But I eventually decided to just let any thoughts about these things just pass, instead of dwelling on them when they came to mind.

So I went, and I picked up my date at her home. I turned on the nav system, and drove to our venue.....a very popular concert. (I purposely omit a lot of details when I write these things, so that there will be some possibility of not being busted if anyone I know comes across the blog).

It went beautifully. Almost perfectly. I was able to simultaneously keep a conversation going, drive, and follow the nav system's directions without making mistakes. I was even able to find parking, another little thing I'd worried about.

Good news...as I hoped, my comfort level with the girl was higher than before. (This was only the second time I had ever seen the same person twice; and of course, the first person I saw twice was a Platonic). Voice was a little off again, but I didn't have much trouble thinking of things to say - I started with 4 or 5 topics I had in mind going in, and just worked from there.

I was extremely thankful to have made it through the first driving part, which I knew had the biggest potential for problems. So we went to the concert, and I had this thing together...we got there early, I suggested food, and I paid, with no arguments. It was pretty close to perfect.

Didn't talk much during the concert, but I turned and smiled at a few appropriate times.

Fast forward to the end of said concert.... this was going pretty darn well. My date had touched me a couple times, definitely a good sign. She asked me something about family and height, possibly another good sign. And she seemed completely relaxed with me, even with me driving, and talked a lot. Like the first time, we had a few laughs together. And at some point early on she had given me a subtle compliment about my physique. And she had at one point said something about me coming to see her sing sometime. A future? Ahhhh!!!!!! There was virtually no awkwardness! And I was becoming comfortable with her as well, driving and all.

Now one thing I didn't mention is that I had spent a lot of time thinking about this date beforehand, and I was hell-bent on kissing on the second date. The concert was kind of amazing, but I didn't really care about it...I was thinking things more along the lines of, "Come hell or high water, I'm going to walk my date to her door this time (unlike the first of the five dates I've now been on) ."

I thought about kissing her once at a red light on the way back, when I looked over at her and she actually wasn't talking. I wasn't seriously considering it..it was just a passing thought. But I was determined to do it when I dropped her off, which would have been a good time, I thought. I had it all planned out in my mind...I was going to take her hand, look into her eyes, tell her to have a good night, and then just do it!

But I'm obviously an amateur at this stuff. When we got to her place, it was an apartment building, and I pulled up directly in front of the well-lit door. There was very little distance between the car and the front door.....not significant walking distance, and it was in perfect sight.

I couldn't figure out what to do fast enough! Did it make sense to say I was going to walk her to her door, when her door was such a short distance away..?! What if I instead walked her to her apartment unit door inside of the building? Is that out of the norm...would it be too intrusive?! Could I just kiss her here in the car?

So she said something like "Thanks. I had a fun time. I really appreciate it." Wow...I don't know if that's good, bad, or neutral. Not crazy about the "appreciate it" part, but I'm in no position to be analyzing woman-speak. I responded with "Alright" 2 or 3 times, probably not good, but I'm a rookie. (After thinking about it for 2 hours, I think the best response would have been "Alright. It was good seeing you again!")

So I came to the probably-incorrect conclusion that I shouldn't try to walk her to her door...at that moment, I didn't think it would make sense (That is what is KILLING me right now. The conclusion I've come to now is that I should have walked her to her inside, apt. unit door...still not 100% sure though).

What about kissing her in the car? I didn't see the opening...for a second I thought I could do it if she made a move to hug me or something. But she didn't...it seemed like she never even looked in my direction long enough. And then she was working on opening her door, so it was over.

Nooooooooo!!!!! I was screaming for the next half hour on the way home. The first of my five dates had gone well until I blundered at the end, and I had been determined not to do the same thing. This was in my control. But I still managed to screw up the ending!!! If I could have paused things to think about it, I would have been fine. But I couldn't, and I didn't think fast enough, and there are no do-overs.

My fear is that by not kissing on the second date, I will end up in the classic Friends Zone. Plus, even if I manage to get a third date (wouldn't that be amazing?), it seems like I will just have a lot more opportunities to screw something up before I have the chance for another kiss.

And for the record.....I'm starting to really like the girl. In case you're wondering, I met her on eHarmony. (Funny side note...during the concert, they started playing the eHarmony commercial theme song!! I looked at her and we both smiled. If I had kissed her then and there, it would have been like being on the commercial...LOL!!)

Still reading?! Shocking. Ok...where do I go from here? After my fourth date, I redoubled my efforts on match.com, because I had already ended communication with almost everyone on those sites. So now I'm communicating with more girls than ever....I intend to stick to this plan, trying to socialize as much as possible and get comfortable and skilled at these things.

Like I said though, I do like the girl from eHarmony. She's really growing on me, which is probably a bad thing for me. Right now my plan is to do whatever other dates I can this week, but call her (no more e-mails) the day after tomorrow and ask her out again. (Another issue is that I usually consult Google to find out how to proceed in dating, but I haven't yet found anything about what to do after a second date). In doing so I will be fearlessly braving the possibility of another, potentially devastating Friends Speech. So root for me!!!

P.S.
Geez. I wrote this entry to vent, but I really ought to try to put this meeting into perspective with the plan I talked about in the Inhibition post. Well, my inhibition level seemed as low as ever on a date, and almost as low when I went out with the other girl As Friends.

So there were 2 strategies I was supposed to be employing. One of them was just being myself and not trying to impress with anything I said. I stuck to that, but without needing to even think about it. The second thing was "forcing" past my inhibitions anything that I thought about saying or doing. I did that, too, but it didn't seem like a big deal....I just said things quickly when they came to mind instead of overthinking them. So right now it looks like that technique works like a charm....time will tell though, I will keep you informed.

Oh...and the date lasted 5 hours.

Inhibition

The other day I went in Barnles & Noble to try to find the book The Magic of Believing. It turns out that B&N isn't like Borders - they don't have computers for you to look things up on; you have to ask a sales associate. For a few minutes, I dreaded asking where to find this book. I was so embarrassed thinking of asking for a self-help book that I was ready to drive 15 minutes up the road to go to a Borders. Wow!

That was really bad. Completely irrational - I would never see that sales associate again, and it's not even an embarrassing book to ask for! Crazy, but I came to my senses after a couple minutes. I realized that if I couldn't ask a simple question about a book, this mission had no chance to succeed. So I put back into practice that stuff I talked about before regarding Inhibition, and just did it. Of course, it was fine. As for the book itself...I thought it could be something to help for the mission, or at least something to help me better understand my own intense ambition about this. But after 28 pages, I decided the book was way too ridiculous, and I probably won't read anymore of it.

So, this weekend I should be going on my first second-date ever. This is interesting, because second-dates seem to call for a male to do some things that are very uninhibited. I couldn't quite bring myself to do it the first time, but on a second date, a compliment or three will probably be in order. And, hopefully, a kiss. When I'm still having trouble being uninhibited enough to be myself in mere, basic conversation, how can I possibly handle such things?

On my successful date, I was trying out my second theory, and it seemed to work somewhat well, although I didn't do a great job of carrying it out. I will elaborate on it here, but I won't waste too much of your time on it until I've had a chance to try it out some more and see if it really works consistently:

The Inhibition Solution (Theory #2)
Try to force myself into some uninhibited behavior. Dancing in the streets would work, but starting out, it's easier and good enough to force some comments, questions, jokes, compliments, etc. in conversation. Sometimes things come to mind to say, but I feel too inhibited to say them. The plan is that whenever that happens, defy the inhibition and do it anyway.

The idea is that by force, you have allowed yourself to indeed be yourself, a little more than usual. And these things that you're usually too inhibited to do or say are usually fun, and they certainly are all reflective of you being more open. Those are things that whoever you're talking to will certainly respond to positively. Those positive responses should reinforce the behavior of being yourself, allowing you to eventually be able to do it without needing to force anything.

Now, what I learned the first couple times that I tried this theory is that you don't simply have to use force: you usually have to use brute force! This is simple stuff on paper, but when I've been in social situations, I've felt too much inhibition to say even some simple things, despite my strong will.

It's really a lot like jumping out of a window when you know there's a trampoline to catch you, but you can't see said trampoline. It requires a leap of faith, and some intense willpower in the moment, but you can certainly do it.

The beauty of this approach (in contrast to my original theory of passivity) is that it puts you in complete control, and its success depends on your willpower, rather than your being able to relax yourself into some special, comfortable state of mind.

And lastly, just be yourself! Don't try to make yourself seem any more interesting, or anything like that. When other people respond positively to you when you're not making an extra effort, or putting on any kind of show, that will also reinforce your normal, relaxed, uninhibited manner.

I feel good about this theory. Of course, I will be practicing it every chance I get, so I will let you know how well it actually works.

Fourth Time's A Charm

Finally, results from my fourth date: success! I communicated with her over e-mail afterwards, and she enthusiastically accepted a second date, for this weekend. That's pretty great, because, as you may recall, I was really down after the third one-and-done. More on this next post.....

Anyway, my Monday platonic meeting was cancelled. I plan to try to meet up again sometime with the person from Sunday's. As for Saturday's....I really need to find a way to clarify that it is STRICTLY platonic! That night, the girl kind of followed me to my car, as if there was possibly going to be some kind of romantic goodbye...geez. And the next day, she sent me an e-mail that read like a date follow-up e-mail: She wanted to let me know that she'd had a fun time, even though she stormed off because I was making ridiculous arguments.

Wait, what? Yeah, I was so comfortable in this meeting that I was able to really be myself, and playfully repel her with some silly argument of mine. That's a big-time milestone, so I won't complain that I've got a girl after me who I'm not romantically interested in.

A New Friend?

Today I had my third platonic meeting (seventh overall, sixth overall different person, second different platonic person). This one was special. I had exchanged a whopping 160 e-mails with this girl in almost 3 months without even talking to her on the phone. Plus, her original craig's list post had been about her being shy, and needing someone patient, etc. So I figured all of this would create for an interesting meeting. Would they cue the crickets chirping sound effects when we got together? After all, in every other meeting to this point, the girl had done over 90% of the talking, easily.

Well, surprisingly, this was no exception. This girl was as talkative as anyone I've ever met. And I've met some extraordinarily talkative people. Like the first Platonic, I wasn't nervous at all going into this one. We first said hello and talked for a few minutes, then hit some awkwardness: she said she was doing all of the talking and I was just staring. I completely drew a blank on anything to say in response, so that went on for another few seconds. It was okay though, because once the conversation resumed (she maybe asked a question to wake me up), it didn't let up for the next 2 hours 15 minutes or so. This girl considers herself shy?! I was expecting my female counterpart, but she seemed to be the opposite. Unbelievable.

Anyway, my inhibition level was between low and moderate. It's hard to tell, because she was doing about 99% of the talking. As a result, I wasn't sure what if anything I learned this time. So I decided to practice not obsessing over the interaction afterwards, and I was pretty successful with that. Hmm, what else? Hopefully we can meet up again and be friends, without any of the platonic-nature misunderstandings that I talked about yesterday. That would be awesome, because that would mean I would have a total of 2 offline friends. We'll see.

A seventh meeting...pretty cool, because when I started this thing I couldn't even imagine how I would get the ball rolling and actually try what I was writing about in the blog. I think I'm at a new stage now. At a minimum, I have little or no anxiety going into these meetings, so that helps me be able to do a lot of them, so that I can increase my social experience and comfort level as much as possible. The Simple Plan. Plus, I no longer feel the need to write out a list of conversation topics every time...I have a few things in mind, casually, no pressure.

Tonight I called up (without overthinking it or procrastinating) another girl from craig's list's platonic section, and arranged a tentative meeting for tomorrow. She mumbled something about being nervous tonight because we'd be meeting tomorrow. Oh goodness, why?! Even I am not nervous about it. Seems to suggest some more Platonic Misunderstanding madness. This even after I pointed out to her last phone call that I met her under the Platonic section of craig's list.
Craigslist.com is a useful tool for my Mission, so I am going to try to adopt the new strategy of tellling people from there that I am dating someone, from the get-go.

Speaking of which....I never gave you results from my fourth date. This time I decided to try e-mailing her afterwards, no phone. She wrote a good amount the last time she e-mailed me, so I think this one is still alive (as you'll recall, the date went better than the first three). I just sent her an e-mail asking her out to a concert next weekend, so...call it a milestone: it's the first time I've ever asked a girl out on a second date.

Strictly Platonic

Well, this is an action-packed weekend for my Mission. I have platonic meetings set for Saturday, Sunday, and Monday. The first is done, and it's worth a few words.

This was the sixth meeting overall, and the first time I met up with the same person for a 2nd time. I went bowling with the first girl I met online, from craig's list's strictly platonic w4m section.

I was never really anxious about meeting her, even the first time (when we talked for 2 1/2 hours), possibly because she thought I would be shy offline even when we were e-mailing. Or maybe platonic meetings don't make me nervous in general? Hmmm, I guess we will see this weekend.

So anyway, this one lasted about 2 hours. It turns out there isn't a whole lot of time for two people to talk while bowling...a few comments after each frame, mostly things related to the game. I can safely say I had no anxiety at all this time, and guess what? There was little inhibition to speak of. After bowling, we talked for a bit and I had no trouble whatsoever thinking of things to say. I even debated the Larry Craig scandal with her, in my normal humorous fashion. I was pretty much myself.

Awesome....that's quite substantial progress for the Mission. I managed to get to the point of actually being myself around someone after seeing them only a single time. Sounds like I have my second offline friend. Exciting stuff, so why not more enthusiasm in this blog entry?

Slight complication.....I'm concerned this girl may have something in mind other than friendship. As I mentioned a few weeks ago, the first time I talked to her she said something about another guy she'd met from her craig's list ad, and not being interested in him. What the heck? Her post was listed under "Strictly Platonic." I started to get a little concerned this time when she let me pay for everything without offering. And when we left, she said something like "thanks for a good time." That sounds like the stuff of dating...certainly not what I was going for.

The moral of the story is to beware of people posting under "Strictly Platonic" on craig's list. It would be great to have this girl as a friend, but I will have to figure out a way to make it clear that we are thoroughly in the Friends Zone.

Don't get me wrong, though. I'm happy and amazed to even have such a problem... :)