A Charlie Brown Blind Date

One fateful evening whilst talking to my mom about the upcoming plans to my trip homeward for the holidays, my mother suddenly says, "I think I should warn you about this..."

My mom isn't an overly dramatic person, so when she starts a sentence like this, I'm expecting something bad, "Oh? What's up?"

"You remember Dianne?"

I think for a second and go down the very large list of people my mother knows (which is about 1/4 of my hometown), "Your house keeper?"

"No."

Thinking more, "Oh that lady whom I met this past thanksgiving?"

"Yeah, that's the one. Well, she REALLY likes you."

"I'm a likable person... what's up?"

"Well she has this 35 yr old UNMARRIED son that you're going to go have coffee with when you're here visiting."

(Silence for 20 some seconds...)

"You did WHAT?!!"

"I have nothing to do with this. It's Dianne, she loves you and feels that you just HAVE to meet her son."

"Because....? I mean asides the fact that we're similar aged and unattached, why would this be a match? What's his name? What does he do?"

"Uhhh, Steve? Stephen? And he may work at Safeway (a grocery mart)? I'm not sure."

".... You haven't even MET him?"

Grrrreat. I felt so betrayed. Granted it's been awhile on the dating scene. I don't mind the chance to meet someone new, especially if a common friend believes that we may hit it off. However admitting that she hasn't even MET the guy, that doesn't sit well in my book. My mom is single and should know, like every other single girl on the planet, that this scenario is a taboo.

Sensing my utter dislike of the situation my mom played the guilt card, "Well I really like Dianne as a friend and it would be impolite for you to say no."

I don't protest knowing that there's nothing that I can do to stop not one, but TWO mothers with an agenda, and hung up the phone to ponder my fate.

Of course this becomes a hot topic among my friends upon hearing the news. I debated letting people know of this blind date, but figured that it would be at the very least a funny story to relay. My thoughts first rounded the prospect that Steve works at a grocery. My fear was that he was a cart boy in which translated to "low ambitions". It's not that I'd only date professionals, but guys whom I'm interested in usually have some sort of ambition. The next is looks of course...why hasn't my mother seen this treasure of the human males? I was not expecting the Hugh Jackman or George Clooney type. But still, if his mom is pimping for him ... what does THAT say? Someone mentioned, "Well he could be absolutely RIPPED!"

"How you figure that?"

"If he is a 35 yr old cart boy, think of all the years he spent pushing long lines of carts through snowy parking lots?"

Ha ha.

So I go home and while eating the first family meal, "Oh the date is set for next Tuesday."

"I see. He'll come pick me up for dinner?"

"Well, not exactly," my mom says nervously.

Uh oh. What now?

"They are coming over with Chinese food."

"Wha? They?"

"Yeah, Dianne is coming over bringing Chinese food and you'll meet Steve then."

Ok, I lost it right there and threw a laughing fit. WTF?!

"Since when is it called a blind date with BOTH mothers are present? Aren't we going to have the pastor over that week too? Why not ask him to come Tuesday? We'll make it an arranged marriage package deal!"

This whole scenario was passing the stratosphere of being surreal.

Tuesday night arrives. Apparently Steve had some smarts and talked himself out of the dinner afterall. He would pick me up for coffee later on in the evening. The dinner with his mom was still on tho. She arrived on time with food in hand. The tension was sooooo thick, you'd could stand a spoon in the air. After some pleasantries, Dianne said to me, "I hope you don't think this is weird."

Me deciding to be just me as always, I put my arm around her and chirped back, "Dianne dear, we're waaay past the point of being weird."

Forced laughter.

Later on, while I'm serving the table, Dianne gushed, "Oh my, you're just like Cinderella."

She's flirting with me? I looked around the table seeing uncomfortable faces everywhere. Oh well, I said in full glee, "Why? Is Steve picking me up in a pumpkin?"

More forced laughter.

Not even 10 minutes into eating - ding dong. Steve made an early appearance. He entered the room as I'm mid mouthful of chow mein. My mom decided to introduce him as if she's known him for years and he looked blankly at me. I swallowed and smiled. Ok... now what? I asked him whether he'd like to join us. He said "no". There's little conversation, as if everyone was waiting for me to start the date. AWKWARD much? So I resigned to quickly finishing my food and getting my coat while Steve watched a bunch of women talk about crafts.

Just before we leave, "Oh where are you guys going?" quipped Dianne.

"Why? Would you like to join us there too?" I answered back.

At this point we were all experts on forced laughter.

We get into the car. Steve has said nothing other than "Hi" to the to dinner group. I turned to him and said, "Well, I must admit. Usually I wait til' date 8 or 12 before having dinner with the mother."

Forced laughter is a familial trait in Dianne's family.

So onto the date itself. In which was (as I predicted) anti-climatic. To my relief, Steve wasn't missing a body part or sported a clubbed foot, however no sparks flew for physical attraction on my side. Steve was just average in my sights. That's not a turn off - I'm not a model myself. He had a kind face, but no weak knees effect (again, as expected).

He took me to the nearest coffee place - a sign to me that he didn't want to go all out to impress for this epic date. We ordered our drinks and the "fun" began. I took the mostly-silent-car-ride as an indicator that I would have to be the initiator of the conversation, so I started in with the general questions. No cart boy, but cashier... for almost 18 years. I tried to put a positive spin on this: Steady job FTW? But in the back of my mind: we don't like challenging ourselves do we? 

His mom told me in that 10 minute supper that he LOVES science. Shows promise, let's move to that. He asked me about my job and was really really really interested that I used to wrangle worms for my Masters. Bacteria were dull, but worms - WOW (and I'm the opposite). His love of science really was from reading Popular Science magazine. I have read a few issues in my day. For me the mag is about hyped science gadgets and far out theoretical ideas. Kinda like reading a magazine from the 1950s that everyone in 2010 will drive flying cars. Possible, but waaaay out there. I tried to chat about the latest buzz of NASA (in)famous recent release of arsenic life. He hadn't heard of it. Back to goats being able to milk spider silk. Riiiight. 

Onto hobbies, which he had none (and didn't want to add to that fact). Oooook, I volunteered my own hobby: hockey, natch. "Oh, I hate hockey." (BUZZZER) It's not that my Person Right requires a DIE HARD passion of hockey. He doesn't have to like it. But "hate"? And no follow up about why? How long? Not an inkling of interest that he wanted to get to know my sport. So I soon asked, "Well do you like any sports?"

"I'm not a sports person."

"So I take it that you're not a Rider fan either." (see my last blog entry)

He shook his head in disgust, as if the mere idea to support the Green n' White was laughable. (BUZZ BUZZ BUZZZZZZZZZER)

I was waiting for him to ask me more about myself, my family, anything that remotely would show that he was interested in getting to know me. He was interested with how long my folks were divorced (great date question!), but I understood the inquiry as "unhealed wounds" with prior knowledge that his own folks recently divorced... 5 years ago. Nearing the end of the date, I found myself listening to him complain about the 101 ways to piss a cashier off. Even my jokes about servicing crazy customers fell flat. At the end of 112 minutes (yes, I was the counting minutes!) I was grasping for straws on topics regarding all-about-Steve. If this date showed me anything, it's reaffirming that deaf people make fantastic listeners.

Finally the shoppe was closing and Steve asked me "When are you in town next?" with the tone like he had to ask. I mentioned that the next visit I would busy due to my granny's surgery, to which he only said, "Ok." No phone number, no email, no facebook friend request. He took me back and I chalked the date as all hype and no finish. One for my books.

Five days later, my mom nods to her computer screen. An email! From Dianne! (of course):

I finally got to talk to Steve about his date with Nancy. He said that she was nice but far too "with it" for him. Please tell Nancy that I'm so sorry for putting her through this ordeal. She's such a nice, funny, smart, good looking girl. Steve is just stuck in his ways and won't see the forrest for its trees.

A nice rejection letter - FROM HIS MOM. 

One for my books indeed.

Edit: One of the BEST comments prior to the fateful night was: So he's your blind date and you are his deaf one? LAWL! Thanks Tiki!