Oh, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I went to the top of my emotional rollercoaster and then plummeted down to the nadir of the metaphorical canyon that opens up in my soul every once in a while. Then I was fine, but just really busy. And now I'm still fine and still busy, but I can't leave it any longer to write or else no one will ever click on my blog again and I will feel abandoned and the canyon will come a-calling once again.
So. There was the boy - yes, the one I was emailing last week. Things with him are now over, so I am free to write as much as I like about him without fear of retribution. He was (briefly) lovely. Very, very good looking. And quirky and interesting. And he seemed to be extremely taken by me. Despite my best efforts to remain distant and coquettish (always my strong suits), he won me round by emailing the longest, funniest messages to me on a very regular basis, and always seeming to want to spend more and more time with me whenever we met up. Which was admittedly only twice. But, you know how these things can spiral out of control. I did all I could not to get excited, but at some point on our second date, possibly shortly before he initiated planning our third, I became really quite hooked on him. And I can identify the precise moment it happened. Reader: he walked on the road side of the pavement.
I hope for your sake that that phrase means absolutely nothing to you. For the lucky uninitiated, walking on the road side of the pavement is a pathetically archaic etiquette practice, whereby men walk on the side of the pavement nearest the traffic, ostensibly to protect women from the splashes and dirt thrown up by the horses and carriages driving by. Today, it is rare that a man walks to the road side of me. My father does it. So does my friend Donald. But it is unusual. And every cell in my brain knows that that is as it should be. It is a ridiculous practice. I mean, perhaps when it is pouring with rain, maybe then, it could be justified. But really - it's outdated and anachronistic, other synonyms - and possibly degrading. Yet, oh, it made me go weak at the knees. When he later gestured towards the wall seat at our restaurant table and said 'Ladies face the room', I practically swooned.
What is it with me and manners? On paper, I know they're ridiculous. They go against my politics, my ideas of female equality and my rational brain. And, as Sarah pointed out the other day, there is even something a bit artful about those moves, as though a boy knows too much, perhaps something a bit dangerous about chivalry, a warning sign?, although I think that depends on the boy. And yet, and yet - I love it when a man carries my bag without being asked. I love being helped on with my coat. I love being given the best seat. I love having the car door opened. And I love, love, love walking on the not-road-side. It's indefensible, I know - but I think it might be something to do with the fact that I am not petite, physically or in character - when I am made to feel like a lady who is in need of protection, even it is from the invisible mud that is not splattering from the carriages that are not passing us, it fulfills some dark need in my nature to be cherished. Sad but true. Am I evil? I'm sorry.
Anyway - so he walked on the road side of the pavement, and then he let me sit with my face to the room, and then he kissed me and then I went home and then the next day he said he didn't want to see me any more. Retard.
I'm fine now, really, and I have four - count 'em! - dates on the horizon. Obviously I swore off all men after the recent rejection debacle, in order to rebuild my self-esteem on my own, but as soon as someone else asked me out, my self-esteem miraculously returned to former levels and I am now feeling chipper and robust once more. It'd be lovely if my happiness didn't depend quite so much on boys fancying me, but hey, I'm a 31 year old girl with hourglass curves and lots of lovely dresses: it'd be a shame to let this all go to waste.
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