Mr. Unavailable #120: Bored? Go For Cake

See Sweet Virginia, The First Date, Just Desserts, To Nobu or Not to Nobu, The Duel, The 36-Hour Freakout, Him, Himself and He, Million-Dollar Me, One Block from Heartbreak,

I'd Like to Introduce You to the Curb and Life is Great

for the background on this one.

You’re going to be so unimpressed with me. To stave off your judgment, I’ll argue that I’m only human. I was bored. Really bored. Nothing more was happening with #121, nothing ever happened with #123 and all I was doing was going on interviews and getting closer and closer to actually having to take a job. I needed a diversion. And when I need a diversion, I think about doors left open, men not slept with…so my little brain went backwards in time to #120.

I’d already been seeing him regularly at our usual Monday night gathering of like-minded downtowners, so he was hard for me to shake—mentally, I mean, and I began thinking of him fondly again. I had this idea to ask him if he wanted to get together for some friendly cake. It had been long enough and seemed innocent enough.

And it was an innocent enough Sunday...I was cleaning my apartment...I had plans to meet some friends for a movie...that sort of thing. Between cleaning, I composed an instant message on Facebook and let the arrow hover over the send button for about an hour—I’d leave it and come back, leave it and come back. Finally just before I left for the movie, I hit send. It said: “Cake.” I left it intentionally open-ended. It could just mean I was thinking about cake at that particular moment and needed to share my thoughts with someone. Or it could mean that I’d just eaten a lot of cake and was feeling sick. Or it could mean that I wanted to get together with him for cake. It was up to him to decide.

By the time I came home from the movie, there was a message: “Really? Love to.” He’d picked up on my true intent.

I suggested Tuesday and heard nothing back. Then on Monday, as I was getting ready to head to the Monday usual, I got a text.

#120: Cake before?

Me: It would hafta be fast cake. Drive-thru cake. Instacake.

#120: Meet at magnolias

Me: Where is that?

#120: West vill

It was only an hour until the Monday night usual, so I knew that by the time I hiked all the way over to Magnolia's, we wouldn’t have time for cake. Besides, he should come to me.

I wrote: : Hmm. How about the little cupcake shop. Prince and mulberry I think. Just thinking time wise. Might be easier.

#120: Cool.

I got there first and waited, texting him the proper cross streets. When he got there, we hugged in a large way. In a good way. And I was nervous in that I-like-this-guy way. Standing in front of the cakes looking at them through the glass as if they were hospital newborns, we leaned against each other gazing, colluding, salivating. We chose, he bought and we sat down to catch up, stealing bites of the best, frostingiest parts of each others' cake.

It was just like old times. We'd start a thread of conversation and it would run off into something completely unrelated until one of us brought it back to the original thread. He told me he’d quit his job two days before, re-entering the charmed life he'd been leading. I told him I was about to take a job in a few days, ending the charmed life I’d been leading. We caked fast and then headed west. I had to help set things up and, because of the time crunch, asked if he could help me, but when we got there, he just threw up his hands as if he didn’t know what to do.

After the usual, a large group of us went to eat and #120 and I ended up at opposite end of the table. Before the bill even arrived, he paid and came over to say good-bye. “Thanks for going for cake,” he said, touching my shoulder. “Yeah, it was good to hang out,” I said. And then he was gone.

I hadn’t told Nora that I’d broken down (again, very human) and had asked him for cake, so I was worried she had overheard. But she hadn’t. Fortunately for me, the broker she’d had an ongoing crush on (“He’s my future husband, he just doesn’t know it,” she’d say) was there and she was wrapped up in his presence.

The next day, I met Evan at Whole Foods before Naked Angels and told him why I was so woe-is-me.

“If you still like him, maybe you should just send him an email saying, ‘Look, I still have feelings for you, let’s try and date and just see what happens,’” he said. “Personally, though, I don’t think he’s worth it. He’s not really a man. He’s kind of wimpy.”

It was easy for him to say. Evan, at that moment, was in love. He’d met a plus-sized model from Sweden and was smitten. Yes, a Swedish model. Clearly, he was against settling.

I left #120 alone but saw him the next Monday usual. He looked alone with no one to talk to, so I magnanimously went over to say hello.

"What's going on?" I said casually.

“Oh, the reason I went outside for a bit was because Billy called. Can you imagine that? A three-year-old just calling all on his own,” he said.

My magnanimity disappeared.

A. I hadn’t noticed he’d gone outside.
B. "Billy" was his ex-girlfriend’s son.
C. I really didn’t want to hear about his ex-girlfriend’s son.
D. It meant he was still in contact with his ex-girlfriend.

All fond feelings evaporated. A group of us went over to the restaurant to eat and I was annoyed when he sat down across from me. He was telling me some story about how someone had stolen his credit card number but had only spent $10.

“Are you sure you didn’t just buy something and forget? What did they buy anyway?” I asked.

“Something online, like porn, but you can get porn for free, so it doesn’t make any sense. They weren’t very smart.”

“So, you usually get your porn for free?”

He got quiet and shifted in his seat.

“It’s OK, I already know about the hookers,” I said.

“I told you about that?” he asked.

“Yes, I asked you if you’d ever hired prostitutes and you said you didn’t want to lie so you weren’t going to answer my question.”

“I’m going to stop digging my hole now,” he said.

Still visibly uncomfortable, a few minutes later he went outside to smoke and then a few minutes after that waved through the window and pointed uptown to indicate he was leaving.

Evan was right. He was no man.

The next day, I was hanging out with Eva, telling her about #120’s lameness and the phone rang. It was him.

“Holy shit. It’s him. He hasn’t called me in weeks…months,” I said.

I didn’t pick up. I listened to the message after and all he'd said was, “I was trying to find that glasses frames store that we went to, but I can’t find it. It was on 9th or 10th. I’m around there now. Let me know if you remember where it is…”

That was it. No “Bye” or “Hi, hope you’re doing well,” or, more likely, the truth: “I’d like to get together but I’m too much of a loser to just ask you if you’d like to meet up, so I’m just going to see if you’ll come running to meet me.”

“Ugh,” Eva said. “Treat 'em mean, keep 'em keen. Don’t call him back. He’s fishing.

And then he called three more times but left no message. Then he sent a text. All it said was, “Found it.”

I waited an hour to make it seem like I had only just seen his messages and texted him back.

Me: “You called me four times about a glasses frames store?”

#120: Yeah? Cool huh!

Me: Painfully cool.

#120: I’ll take that

Diagnosis: For him: He’s a terrible fisherman. And not much of a man either.
For me: I’m so done taking the bait from this particular fisherman. Yes, I did fish first a bit with “Cake,” but there’s an acceptable double standard at work here. Ultimately, though, if I hadn't been completely done with him by this point, I certainly was now.

Me and Mr. Unavailable: A Mr. Unavailable Becomes Available

This is a story about a friend of mine—let’s call him Phil. According to most, Phil was a confirmed Mr. Unavailable. I never thought he was the most attractive of men, and he often seemed a little withdrawn, which, of course, makes sense if you're unavailable. But he was successful in business and somehow always managed to get dates. He’d even have short-term girlfriends. I was always surprised to find out that he would be the one to end the brief relationships; after a month or two, he’d say impassively, “Yeah, I ended that…” and then say no more.

I hadn’t seen Phil in about a year. I’d last heard about him six months ago. A mutual friend had told me that he’d broken up with a woman and was upset about it. I figured that was progress. Little did I know, it was much more than that.

I ran into him two weeks ago and what I saw was a changed man. I asked him how he was. There was something easier and more open about him. He was forthcoming and filled me in on the girlfriend. He said they’d broken up six months ago, but that he had only recently processed it. At the suggestion of his shrink, he’d gone to the Karen Foundation and started to work on himself.

“It totally opened up my heart. It broke me wide open. I cry all the time now,” he said, starting to well up. “See, I’m doing it now.”

“You’re totally different,” I said, circling my hand in front of him as if sensing an aura of whole-cloth change.

“Yeah, I’ve been getting a lot of that,” he said.

He’d broken up with the woman as he usual did, he said: he sensed she was going to end it, so, totally numbed out, he beat her to it. But then something happened that had never happened before. He felt horrible and began to really look at why he felt that way. He was able to admit to himself that there was something very wrong with how he’d been operating. He knew he had to change.

He wrote the woman a love letter but got no response. It was obvious he was crushed. “It just means I’m open for the next one,” he said, sounding as though he still hadn’t let go of her.

I described how #111 had acted like I was breaking up with him when he was breaking up with me. Phil said, “Yeah, that’s what I do. He couldn’t do the relationship. He’s unavailable. You were waiting until he opened up. My girlfriend was patiently waiting for me to open up, but I couldn’t do it. Now, I’ve lost her.”

Validation—especially from a Mr. Unavailable expat—is sweet.

As I mentioned, Phil had never been very attractive to me, but, as I talked with him, he became more attractive. It looks like we’ve both made progress.

Diagnosis: Mr. Unavailables can change. If they really want to.

Mr. Unavailable #124: Quebecois Cub

Vital Stats: 5’5"-7”. “Cub” is a bit of a stretch because he was 35. In the insurance business, he’s the guy who creates new combinations of insurance or “products” (like butter or hot dogs) Aesthetic: Eurohip Yuppie. Demeanor: Intelligent, jocular, liked to tease.

First Date: Sugar Sweet Sunshine bakery on Rivington on the Lower East Side.

First Impression: It was the Great Five-Day Downpour of 2011, so when I walked up to the cupcake shop, he was standing under the awning with an umbrella. I towered over him by about two inches, which meant that he was likely not the 5’7” his profile said but, more likely, 5’5”.

After a European two-cheek kiss, we walked into the bakery and, although I was somewhat disappointed by his stature, he seemed pleasantly surprised by mine. He couldn’t stop smiling and talking and, after about five minutes of standing in front of the counter not ordering because he was so busy looking at me and talking, I cut in and said, “What should we get?” He got a red velvet cupcake and I got a peanut butter and jelly one. We sat down and I could see he was going to make his cupcake last. It was fine. He was nice enough and smart enough, so it wasn’t necessary to flee.

We talked about traveling and insurance and sugar. He told me about a 12-course dinner he had in a sugar shack on his way back from a business trip in Canada. All the courses included some variety of all-natural sweetener, and he recounted each one. At least we had a love of sweets in common. And, seeing as I was about to start a job at an insurance company the next week, we had insurance in common. I’d talked to Evan the night before at Naked Angels and he said that I needed to get #120 off my mind (after the cake date from the day before, he was still in there).

“You should just shag [#124] no matter what,” he said. “Even if you don’t like him. In fact, it’s probably better if you don’t like him.”

But I couldn’t do it. The messages he sent me before we met had hints of sexual innuendo, such as, “If you cross the line you might deserve a spanking.” But they did nothing for me. In fact, when his messages popped up on my phone, I’d read them and roll my eyes.

So, back to the date. He was cute, funny and smart, talking about Quebec politics and countries in Europe, both of which are infrequent conversational topics in the U.S. dating scene. Finally, the lady behind the counter said they were closing. We’d long since finished our cupcakes, but he was still clearly in no hurry to go. Then the lady behind the counter told us they were closing with a bit more insistence (bless her) and we went. Once outside, he asked if I wanted to go somewhere for a glass of wine. I said I was tired and had to go home and then pointed east saying, “I’m headed that way. Which way are you going?” He was going in the other direction, to his car. “Where do you live?” I asked.

“Mt. Vernon,” he said.

That was a shocker. His profile said he lived in Brooklyn.

I gave him an awkward hug under our awkwardly bumping umbrellas, waved good-bye and walked away.

Signs of Hope: He was a good conversationalist, which is no small thing.

Red Flags: All the eye-rolling I was doing before the date. Plus, that he lied about 1. His height and 2. Where he lived.

Turning Point: At the bakery when I realized I had to slouch in order to look him in the eye.

Diagnosis: For him: Maybe he was just looking for a one-night stand. And maybe the women on the site are usually game. To bad for him I wasn’t.
For me: I realized that cougar online dating is just like regular online dating and that I’m not really into younger men. I mean, I went on a “cougar” date with a guy who was only three years my junior. The 25-year-old was an anomaly. He wasn’t the start of a new pattern, he was an aberration from the old one.

Mr. Unavailable #66: Hopelessly Devoted

This is a Mr. Unavailable flashback circa 1990, Chicago.

Vital Stats: 6’ 2”. Tall, thin but muscle-y, boyishly handsome, dark hair, dark features, brown eyes, lightish skin; I remember really liking the way his facial features went together. It was my freshman year of college; he was a junior. Aesthetic: He was a baseball hat, jeans, T-shirt type of guy. Demeanor: He was a cool, easygoing English major who was, oxymoronically, in Navy ROTC.

First Impression: I somehow didn’t qualify for work-study (my parents, after years of claiming poverty to we three kids, actually made too much money???), so I got a job at my dorm’s food service. I was the fruit wench and he was the ice cream guy. For a few weeks, he was just an older co-worker who would tell me stories about his Friday nights reading poetry with a big plastic tumbler of red wine at his side until one day I was inexplicably crush-struck.

What Happened: On the fateful day the crush struck, I saw him for the handsome specimen he was. He was wry, witty and acted like he hadn’t a care in the world. I don’t know if he noticed how I gradually became more and more self-conscious around him, but I was horrified to discover one day that I’d been calling him by the wrong name. It turned out I was one letter off. He didn’t care. “Matt, Nat, it’s all the same,” he said.

Like I said, he hadn’t a care in the world.

Then one day, he just stopped showing up for work, which, for those like me who like their men unavailable, was terribly impressive. It was also distressing. He left no word of where he’d gone, gave no good-byes…Did he know I even existed? Anguished, I called a friend from high school who had gone to the same college and was living in a dorm uptown and said, “I want to get drunk.” I went to her dorm room and she borrowed someone’s bottle of vodka. I then got drunk-ish (on screwdrivers, bless) for the first time.

Sometime during the second quarter, he was quoted in a story in the daily college paper. It was a story about how students were quitting Navy ROTC because it was a terrible experience and not worth the free tuition. He was one of the dropouts and was quoted in the story, describing Navy ROTC as, “A hierarchy of fear.” What a rebel. I was so impressed. That, combined with the fact of his disappearance, made his existence terribly romantic to me.

In the spring of my sophomore year, my friend Olivia returned from a study date at a café in town and told me she had spotted #66 working behind the counter, presumably to work off all the money he owed Navy ROTC. Enough time had passed that I’d lost most of my freshman 15 and was looking pretty good. It was a week or so before I headed to hike the Grand Canyon for spring break. Olivia and I were breaking in our hiking boots, so we were looking pretty snazzy when we walked into the café and ordered our hot chocolates. I don’t remember the exchange I had with #66, but it was brief. I was a nervous wreck, which didn’t help. We maybe said five words to each other and he seemed pretty disinterested.

I don’t remember being entirely crushed that it hadn’t gone so well. Maybe I was just glad to see him. Or maybe I was just better at denial then. Last I heard, er, Googled, he was married and living in Chicago.

Signs of Hope: We got along well when we worked together at the food service.

Red Flags: Everything other than the fact that we got along well when we worked together at the food service.

Turning Point: I was so deeply in denial about his lack of interest that I don’t think there ever was a turning point; it was true he hadn’t a care in the world, and that world included me. I Google him every now and then to see if he’s still married; part of me still hopes that we might get together one day.

Diagnosis: For him: Completely, totally and absolutely unavailable to me.
For me: Hopelessly, sadly, pathetically devoted to him.

Mr. Unavailable #68: As the Day is Long

This is a Mr. Unavailable flashback circa late 1992 to early 1993, England.

Vital Stats: 5’9”, 19. Fellow student at Sussex. Aesthetic: He looked like he should have been in an indie shoegazer band. He was all cheekbones, lips and anemia. Demeanor: He acted like he should have been in an indie shoegazer band. He was all cool, aloof and depressive.

Background: Eager to escape American university life at an extremely pre-professional school, I spent my junior year abroad in England, on the campus of the University of Sussex just outside Brighton, the pot-smoking, light-class-load antithesis of pre-professional.

First Impression: I probably met #68 at one of the three pubs or the nightclub on campus. I grew fond of him during the various activities we’d find for ourselves: the post-pub smoke-outs in people’s dorm rooms, the unsuccessful mushroom searches in the cow fields, the occasional trips into London to visit the underground goth malls and buy Doc Martens...

What Happened: I was lovey dovey over him for months. I primarily hung out with a group of Brit boys in my time there and, having not hung out much with boys other than my brothers prior to visiting England, I saw signs of his potential interest in everything. He made me a mixed tape and I read into every single song. One night after the pub, he hung out with me in the kitchen and I impressed him with my drunken biscuit-making abilities. In spending post-pub hours with me, I preferred to think he was trying to send me a message: he liked me, too. Or so I hoped.

On the night of #69’s drunken confession that he liked me, I called #68 at about 1 a.m. and asked him if he could come over. He thought it was to discuss #69. He came over to my dorm room and sat down on my bed.

“Actually, I wanted to tell you that I have a crush on you,” I said.

“Oh,” he said as all the air got sucked out of the room. “I have a crush on someone else.”

He left and I went up to my American friend Kiersten’s room. I was distraught. I didn’t know how I was ever going to sleep—ever again. Kiersten told me to drink the Baileys that I’d gotten in Duty Free on our way back from France and skip class the next day. I did as I was told.

As one does at the tender age of 20, I’d put my whole heart into my crush on #68, investing many a feeling in it for months. His rejection was doubly devastating because it was right before Valentine’s Day. Getting out of town seemed like a good idea. I had some time left on my Eurrail Pass, so I took off for a weekend alone in Paris to mourn.

After a few months, I managed to recover, but was still fairly shy around him. Then one day I was in the kitchen with Kiersten. It was pancake day, so, like a good American in Europe, she was making pancakes. Our other American friend, Sean, came in.

“You’ll never guess who was at the les-bi-gay movie night in Brighton last night,” Sean said.

Sean, you see, was gay.

“Who?” we asked.

“[#68],” he said.

A huge grin spread across my face and I started jumping up and down in the middle of the kitchen, yelling, “It wasn’t me! It wasn’t me! Yay! He’s gay! He’s gay! It wasn’t me!”

Signs of Hope: I hadn’t known it, but, clearly, there were none.

Red Flags: I thought it was just his shoegazer mannerisms, but, now looking back, he was somewhat effeminate.

Turning Point: There were two: 1. When I confessed my crush. 2. When I found out he was gay.

Diagnosis: For him: Gay.
For me: I was the victim of my own underdeveloped gaydar. Immediately after this episode, my gaydar reached a level of accuracy that was way ahead of its time.

Mr. Unavailable #69: Where You Goin’ With That Gun in Your Hand?

This is a Mr. Unavailable flashback circa 1992 through 1996, England and Chicago.

Vital Stats: 5’8”, 19 (in 1992) through 23 (in 1996). Aesthetic: 1992 hippy (detailed description below). Demeanor: A fast-talking, heavy-accented, quick-witted Brit.

Background: Eager to escape American university life at an extremely pre-professional school, I spent my junior year abroad in England, on the campus of the University of Sussex just outside Brighton, the pot-smoking, light-class-load antithesis of pre-professional.

First Impression: I probably met #69 at one of the three pubs or nightclub on campus. I don’t remember when it might have been, but I have a pretty good idea of what my first impression was. Brighton was a hippy town and the students were neo-hippies, including #69. Well, especially #69. He had patchy facial stubble and a full head of dirty, shaggy, dirty blonde hair. He wore oversized jumpers with ethnic vests and baggy, patched-up jeans. He also wore a bunch of medallions and other jangling items around his neck and carried coins and things in his pockets, so you could hear him coming from meters away.

I knew he liked me for months. When we would run into each other in the café, he’d pretend to be my therapist to get me to talk about myself and then he’d say, “You know, a lot of times, patients fall in love with their therapists. Just a friendly reminder.”

One post-pub night in a pot-filled dorm room, he confessed his crush on me. I said I had a crush on someone else. Drama ensued. After giving #69 the bad news, I went back to my dorm room to call the object of my crush under the pretext that I was worried about #69. My crush came over and told me that #69 had wandered off into the cow fields, dejected and even more drunk. Then I confessed my crush to him (#68). He replied by saying he had a crush on someone else. Almost everyone went home crushed that night.

It was too bad. #69 was sweet, charming and incredibly funny, but I couldn’t take him seriously until…

…he returned after spring break shaven, with a hair cut and without all the extra layers and adornment. You could actually see his face, and it was cute.

One night at the pub, I stayed and stayed and stayed. He knew what that meant. For the next three years and across two continents, I put the guy through trial after trial. I waffled over whether or not I wanted to be with him, broke up with him, got back together with him, and the whole time, he stayed firm on what he wanted: me. He’d write me poems, sculpt figurines out of wood for me, make me jewelry, draw me pictures, buy me little things. He even got a work visa and moved to Chicago to live with me while I was in grad school.

Sometimes I felt like I loved him, or was in love with him, but not often. Mostly, I couldn't accept him because I couldn’t figure out why he loved me. Sometimes, I’d ask him. He’d tell me, but I never truly believed all the nice things he said about me.

During the good times, we’d troop down to the local bar, The Keg, and talk about the future and how we were going to venture around the world as travel journalists. During the bad times, we’d fight. I wasn’t afraid to fight with him because I knew he wasn’t going anywhere. He was just as to blame for the fighting as I was, but he was never quite as cruel as I was: I’d threaten to break up with him or tell him he was free to date other people—even though we were living together.

When he went back to England in March 1996, I was sure to ask him where the laundry room was before he left because I knew it was over. He had loved me so thoroughly that he gave me just enough self-esteem to dump him.

We kept in touch, though, and a year later, after my failed attempt with #70, I flew to England. We thought there was still something there. The moment I saw him at the airport, I knew there wasn’t. Instead of telling him that, I fortified myself with bottles and bottles of wine and, over the next ten days, pretended. I only told him I didn’t want to do it anymore after I got home, when I was thousands of miles away, just like #70 had done to me.

Signs of Hope: There were moments when I felt like I was in love with him.

Red Flags: Most of the above. I was also rarely affectionate with him. He was so deprived of affection that the few times I’d hold his hand or rest my head on his shoulder, he’d practically swoon.

Turning Point: When I went to see him in England. I had changed so much that there really was no going back.

Diagnosis: For him: He was the most available person I was ever with. He’s now married with a child in London.
For me: I was the one who was completely unavailable. I was so unable to love myself that I couldn’t accept his love. I spent the next 15 years thinking that the opposite of what he was, was what I really needed. I was wrong.

Me and Mr. Unavailable: Cougartown

After my brief dalliance with #121, the 25-year-old construction worker, I was game for further exploration of the younger territories. The night I was over at a mutual friends' and confessed what had happened with #121, I was emphasizing the relief of it all, a vacation from my usual pattern of getting super attached. With this, I said, I had no expectations. I didn’t have to worry about when he’d call or if he liked me or what was going to happen next. It was bliss.

The mutual friend, who’s 47 and has already done the marriage thing, likes the younger ones, too, but has shown an impressive dedication, formalizing her interest by joining dating sites for cougars. She gave me the lowdown on two sites, but, if I was interested, she said, she recommended I start with the free one, Date A Cougar. It turned out #121 had piqued my interest enough to make me interested in a site like that. Although not yet 40, I’m not technically a cougar, but it’s not exactly like you need a membership card. To make it look like I qualified, when I put up my Date A Cougar profile, I posted a photo that emphasized the lines around my eyes.

One of my first messages was from a 24 year old who lived in North Carolina with his parents and a pet bird: “Hey how you been beautiful? Evertime i see your smile i am instantly suck right in like a galaxy in a wormhole.”

And from a 24-year-old in Florida: “You are sexy as hell.”

But probably the most bizarre part—more bizarre than the penis photos, torso shots, multiple self-portraits in bathroom mirrors—was that a lot of the messages came from guys my age or older: 44, 40, 38, 35, 32. Did these guys miss the memo or were they just covering all their bases?

I carefully analyzed the messages and profiles of the men on the site, excluding the ones older than myself, and determined that there are two types of cougar-oriented guys, aka, "cubs": 1. Young men looking for drama-free, no-strings sex. 2. Men who genuinely appreciate maturity and self-confidence in a woman and are generally mature themselves.

The 24-year-old North Carolinian whom I drew in with my wormhole-like smile probably described it best: “Allow me to bring you into my world so you can get a better understanding why i adore women of your caliber. As I grow in age, I value women over 40 most of all. Here are just a few reasons why: A woman over 40 will never wake you in the middle of the night and ask, 'What are you thinking?' She doesn't care what you think. If a woman over 40 doesn't want to watch the game, she doesn't sit around whining about it. She does something she wants to do, and it's usually more interesting. Women over 40 are dignified. They seldom have a screaming match with you at the opera or in the middle of an expensive restaurant. Of course, if you deserve it, they won't hesitate to shoot you if they think they can get away with it. Older women are generous with praise, often undeserved.. They know what it's like to be unappreciated. Women get psychic as they age.”

There was such a disparity between his first statement and the theory about older women that I suspected he plagiarized it from somewhere. Still, one can't deny the wisdom.

Because the next step was to go on an actual date, I eliminated the ones who lived with their parents or were clearly unable to grow facial hair and wound up with #124…

Mr. Unavailable #70: Blue-Green Algae Guy

This is a Mr. Unavailable flashback circa Spring/Summer 1996, Chicago.

Vital Stats: 6”, 24. He worked in an office but fancied himself a furniture designer and sold blue-green algae on the side. Aesthetic: Fortunately, he had a gay roommate, so he wore respectable 1970s thrift clothing—wide collared shirts and cords. Demeanor: Nice, a little cool, handsome.

First Impression: I thought he was quite good-looking, but he was dating Nancy, a woman that my friend Kim and I thought could have been attractive if it weren’t so clear that she lacked even more confidence than we did.

What Happened: It was late spring of 1996. I had just eased myself out of a nearly four-year relationship and was about to finish grad school. #70 was a college friend of my best gay boyfriend, Will. We all went out on weekends. We'd get fired up, as we liked to call it, at their apartment and then head to the Metro or Spin or Cocktail or any of the other clubs and bars. By this time, #70 had broken up with Nancy and the first hints of summer were in the air.

One night, the four of us—me, #70, Will and Kim—found ourselves on the Northwestern Campus for a Mary Zimmerman show (on a side note, I don’t remember the name of the show, but it later became Metamorphosis). Afterward, we headed to the Lakefill to run around, do cartwheels and generally frolic. At the end, the four of us lay in a circle with our heads together, staring at the stars. As our heads brushed against each other, it felt as though I and #70 might be having a moment.

The next morning, Kim phoned. She’d gotten a call from Will who had talked to #70. “I know someone who has a crush on you,” she said.

Could it be?

It was.

#70 and I spent the next month or two hanging out. He came to my graduation. We’d hang out at bars playing pool. I don’t remember any deep conversations or moments of connection. He was known to make conversations come to a grinding halt with comments such as, “Heh heh. That’s funny” or “Heh heh. That’s stupid.” He may not have sounded like good boyfriend material, but he sure looked like it.

Probably even more bizarre than our deep lack of mental connection was our deep lack of physical connection. Even though I’d stay over at his apartment, we never had sex. There wasn’t even a grope in the night. We never even got naked.

“So, have you guys done it yet?” Will would ask every few days. And the answer was always, “No.”

After a month or two of this, #70 drove with me to a friend’s wedding in Buffalo. We stayed overnight in another friend’s guest room and, instead of squeezing onto the twin bed with me, #70 said he had a cold and slept on the floor.

We returned to Chicago and a week later I flew to Houston to visit my parents. My last night there, he called and broke up with me saying he and Nancy were talking about getting back together.

When I got back from Houston, Will told me the whole truth. “He was supposed to break up with you before you went to the wedding, but he wimped out. He and Nancy actually slept together a while ago.”

Signs of Hope: He was cute and, at the beginning of the summer, anyway, he liked me.

Red Flags: We had no real connection of any kind, no real affection of any kind, no real sex of any kind.

Turning Point: When he dumped me over the phone. Looking back, I find it hard to believe that I didn’t suspect something was up, but maybe I didn’t want to suspect something was up.

Diagnosis: For him: What a coward, although his cowardice was actually pretty impressive. Instead of just breaking up with me, he drove hundreds of miles to and from a wedding and then waited another week when I was thousands of miles away to break up with me by phone. Like I said, impressive.

He also turned out to be a terrible furniture maker; when he flipped over a tiled table he’d made to put it in a moving van, all the little tiles fell out, clattering to the ground.

Oh, and the whole blue-green algae thing was a big old pyramid scheme.

For me: After being in a nearly four-year relationship with a man I wasn’t all that attracted to (#69), I just wanted a boyfriend who looked the part. Intelligence, work choices and deeper connectivity be damned. And yes, he broke up with me in a cowardly way, but I kind of did the same thing to #69…

Epilogue: Later that summer, I was talking to a friend at a party and he said, “You never slept with [#70], right?”

“Nope.”

“Good.”

“Why?”

“You didn’t hear it from me, and I don't know when he got it, but it turns out he has herpes.”

Mr. Unavailable #123: Buddy Holly

Vital Stats: 33, 5’9”ish. He had Buddy Holly glasses and dark hair, which made him resemble, well, Buddy Holly. Aesthetic: He had that 1990s gas-station-attendant look going on. Demeanor: Nice, maybe a little shy.

I first noticed him one Friday several months ago. I was coming out of my January/February torpor and had decided to dress up for an evening out. Once out, I was mingling amongst my friends and, as I crossed the room, #123 and I passed each other. I smiled. He smiled.

Things progressed from there as they usually do: invisible to the naked eye. As the days ticked by, I’d see him out and he’d be helping out with things—putting out snacks, restocking the cups, making sure the speakers were working—and so, naturally, I’d tease him. "Oh, that's right, you're the fluffer," I'd say. For the record, I wasn't the one who came up with the nickname. Otherwise, we were mostly hi/bye friends. Then, one night, we ended up seated next to each other. We leaned our heads together, commenting on some of the people in the room. He pointed out one guy’s “murse,” saying it was a nice one.

“Murse?”

“Man purse. This is mine,” he said and then pulled a bag out from under the chair.

“Very nice,” I said. It was also very nice that he had a sense of humor.

The next night, at Heidi's party at the Gershwin Hotel, it was about 1:30 a.m. and things were starting to wind down. We’d moved the dancing from the dance floor to the lounge and suddenly there he was. He’d been there since 11 p.m., he said, but had spent most of his time on the dance floor. I’d been there since 10 p.m., I said, but had spent most of my time in the lounge. Like two ships....

...Anyway, I did some more talking. “I didn’t recognize you without your glasses,” I said. He did look totally different. In a white shirt, he actually looked kind of suave. “With your glasses on, you usually look like Buddy Holly.”

He shrugged.

I do this sometimes. I have this habit of saying things to people and I mean them as a compliment, but, instead of saying, “You look like Buddy Holly, which is totally adorable,” I say, “You look like Buddy Holly," which, clearly, is an observation, not a compliment. As a result, the comment's target doesn’t know what to make of it. I might as well be saying, “I like broccoli.”

After my Buddy Holly comment, instead of learning my lesson, I kept non-complimenting him.

“The way you’re sitting with your arm across the back of the sofa looks like the opening scene in Mad Men.”

“I see you like to dance.”

“You’re dressed differently from how I normally see you.”

Would somebody please stop me? Fortunately, we did a little dancing and then the clock struck 2 a.m. and everyone headed for the coat check. A girl sidled up to him. I don’t know where she’d been while we were dancing, but I wondered if she was with him. Maybe his indifference was not due to the things I was saying but, rather, due to the fact that he wasn’t exactly unattached.

I put on my coat and waved good-bye as I walked out of the room. He waved back.

Signs of Hope: He always seems interested when I see him.

Red Flags: I felt a vague sense of indifference wafting from his direction. Is he just shy? Does he have a girlfriend? Was he not really interested? Did my non-complimentary remarks turn him off?

Turning Point: Dunno. I don't think there's been enough of a buildup to warrant a turning point. Yet.

Diagnosis: For him: Generally, if I’m attracted to someone, eventually they turn out to be somehow unavailable.
For me: It’s nice to have a little bit of a post-#120/#121 crush.

Mr. Unavailable #121: A Victimless Crime

See Unavailable By Design, He Touched Me, Mrs. Robinson, The Fantasy Reaches Fruition... and Superpowers for the background on this one.

It seems that as we get older, the thing to do is go younger. And, just to be clear, young=sex. Everyone is doing it. Or trying it, anyway. Nora. Me. Thousands of women on thousands of cougar sites. Men, in general. Strangely, however, not all of these young 'uns seem to know to strike when the iron is hot. In fact, they don't even seem to be aware that the iron is hot.

Last weekend, Nora met a 29-year-old hockey player at a party at the Gershwin Hotel that Heidi had thrown. At midnight, it was Nora's birthday. “You should give yourself a little birthday present,” Heidi said to Nora as we left the party. The 29-year-old drove us all home and then he and Nora drove off in the direction of her apartment. Nora texted me an hour later.

“He didn’t want to come in, but he kissed me without tongue and asked what I was doing tomorrow? This is very odd…I think he might be wet brain.”

When he drove us home, from the way he talked he did seem a little brain-damaged. I guessed it was from all the hockey, but, could he really be that brain-damaged?

Sadly, it was the same with my 25-year-old. #121 resurfaced on Easter. I walked up to him and said, “Hey.” We hugged, he looked me up and down like a piece of meat, which, again, I loved, and the conversation went like this:

“How was your Easter”

“Good.”

“How was your Easter?”

“Good.”

“You look cute.”

Considering there was considerable sexual tension, the conversation seemed a lot more engaging at the time. Later, passing him as I was on my way out with Kevin, I touched his arm and said, “See you later.”

A few days later, it was a similar scenario when I ran into him—a hug, a few words, a “Good night.”

But that was it. No texts asking to “hang out” again. No suggestive looks from across the room. Nothing.

In both my and Nora’s case, it’s like they needed it spelled out for them:

F-R-E-E S-E-X

The night we’d been together, #121 had emphasized how he kept who he saw a secret amongst our group of friends. I heeded the warning for about a week and then proceeded to tell a bunch of people. In exchange for the gossip, I got, well, more gossip.

To recap for a moment: The night we got together, the ruse both of used to tip-toe into the situation was to say maybe we’d go to Evan’s show together. Fortunately, we quickly determined that we’d rather “hang out” at my place. When we were done “hanging out” and he left, saying that he was going home because he had to work the next day, I looked at the clock and it was 10—the time of Evan’s show. It occurred to me that I could go and I vaguely wondered if he had gone, but I decided I’d rather call Nora and give her the dirt.

One week later, during gossip session #1, I discovered that, after he left my place, he’d gone over to Evan’s show. A sort of victim reflex kicked in. I felt cheated—used—somehow. But then I remembered that I never had any desire to hang out with him in public. And for us to have gone to the show together would have been just plain weird. Not to mention awkward. Not to mention that if the tables had been turned and I had been leaving his place, I would have let him believe I had to work in the morning and then gone over to the show, too. I would have done exactly the same thing.

During gossip session #2 two weeks after that, I found out from a mutual friend that #121, was, in fact, a player. He’d even confessed to one friend that it was “becoming a problem.” I was disappointed. For the purposes of my pursuit of him, I'd chosen to believe he didn’t “hang out” that much, but it should have come as no surprise. Ok, so he slept around. A small part of me had been hoping that I was just a little bit special. After all, as The Only Man With Whom I’d Consider Having a Meaningless Sexual Relationship, he was special to me.

It was too bad. If he’d just stuck with one woman long enough, so to speak, he might have learned a thing or two about becoming a good lay. I was disheartened for two reasons. One, it meant he probably wasn’t coming back for a second roll in the hay. Two, and probably more importantly, I prayed he hadn’t given me anything.

During the second gossip session, I told the mutual friend the details of how we got together and she said, “He picked you up.”

“That’s funny,” I said. “I thought I picked him up.”

“It must have just been about the conquest,” she said as if she hadn’t heard me. “It makes me want to say something to him.”

Wait. Wait. Wait. But I picked HIM up. He was MY conquest. I conquested him. (You know what I mean.)

If there’s one thing I’ve realized from all of this—aside from the fact that (1) 25 year olds are lousy lays, which means I was probably having bad sex for most of my twenties and didn’t even know it and (2) awesome, protective girlfriend loyalty is still strong in the world (word)—people (including myself, apparently) assume that women play certain parts and men play certain parts.

When friends would ask if I’d heard from him and I’d say I hadn’t, I’d get this look of pity and then an, “I’m sorry.”

And then I’d actually start to feel sorry. And I’d wonder why I was feeling sorry. And then I’d remind myself that there was nothing to feel sorry about and say, “There’s nothing to be sorry for. I only wanted one thing from him and I got it.”

It’s like our starting point is: Men=Evil-Doers. Women=Evil-Done-to-Them. But I was no victim. I had no desire to have a conversation with him, to spend quality time with him, to get to know him, to be seen with him in public, to take long walks on the beach, to have picnics in the park, to have romantic candlelit dinners in snowbound hunting lodges, nothing. What I wanted from him was for him to walk into my apartment, pick me up and throw me on my bed. And he did. If there was a crime here, it was a victimless one.