Fear Factor: The Non-Date

If you haven't been there, you're lucky. I have been on non-dates more times than I can count. Now that I think about it, most of my dates (and all of my best dates) have been non-dates. It always starts off as fun, promising, with a palpable potential, that by date's end (or "non-date's non-end" as the case may be) you're emotionally shredded by your confusion, self-doubt and by the messages that you're perceiving as mixed, but which in fact may not be clear, but which you are certainly resisting absorbing. It's like an episode of SNL's "It's Pat," where you're trying to figure out what that person is, and how they fit into your understanding of your life, and everytime you get a (romantically or) sexually charged clue, the person counters it with a term of neutrality. So why not just ask? Just summon up some courage from a nether dimension where courage abounds as a natural resource, and spit out the words into the air? Because courage is in short supply, and we're petrified. And we have good reason to be scared. Most declarations of romantic intent are met with a less than enthusiastic reception, and whatever friendship was beginning to take root usually ceases to grow; it's like our expression of honesty and yearning was death to fertile soil, the emotional equivalent of sowing the earth with salt, so that nothing will ever again grow there. Or, as Ken puts it:

So, instead of making a fool of yourself, you go on a series of these nondates and with each passing one get progressively crazier, act increasingly weirder--you fret, you hope, you worry, you moon, you envy and, yes, you even pine--until finally you just snap and say "HOLY SHIT I CAN'T TAKE THIS ANYMORE. YOU'RE DRIVING ME CRAZY AND I THINK I LOVE YOU." And when that happens? Well, there's a very, very slim chance that the other person will say, "Oh my god. Me too!" But the smart money goes on the other response: He or she shouts "Hey, look over there! It's Steve Perry from Journey!" and then, the minute you turn your head, runs away, never to be seen from again.

Or, in the case of living in a densely packed community like the Upper West Side, you will continue to see that person everywhere. At every social event, at ever synagogue you visit, at every Shabbat dinner everywhere. Frankly, you're going to see them anyway, so there's no point in accelerating the misery by making them uncomfortable too. Better to pull away slightly, for the sake of your own sanity. Besides:

If you find yourself on the third or fourth hang-out, nondate or whatever, chances are you are dating this person only in your own mind. If the other person were as into you as you are into him or her, you'd already be holding hands on the subway, playing tonsil hockey in the park and generally making a nuisance of yourself in public.

And you, being a smart person, have realized that you are doing none of these things. Even if the other person makes you feel like no one else, even if there's a connection there you haven't felt with anyone in years, even if you have a strange conviction that this person is someone who was meant for you, you stay quiet. You wait for the signal, the one sign that will translate into a romantic green light. Sometimes you see glimmers of this everywhere...hints that the feelings run deep on both sides. But nine times out of ten, that's called denial. The signal you're waiting for will never come. You learn that marinating in your own misery is preferable to cutting yourself open and plucking out your heart to offer it to a non-receptive audience. You continue your pining and mooning, and everything else, but treat it as a process of grief. All you can hope for is that after your denial and anger, eventually acceptance will come. In the interim, you paint on your smile, hope it fools everyone else, and try to beat back the sadness. [Inspired, obviously, by Ken's post.]