So on Sunday I wrote to The Nurse. As yet, I have not heard back.
So now, the internal debate begins: do I write her again? Will she bother to answer? Does writing a second time seem desperate? Do I write through the site that organized the hike in the hope that somehow I typed her e-mail address wrong? (Admittedly, this isn’t likely. If I had the e-mail address wrong, it would have produced a bounce-back from the server.) Could my original e-mail have been accidentally stripped from her box as being spam?
Oy. The problem when you’re working in IT in this sort of situation is that, not only are you trying to fathom what the girl is thinking, you’re also trying to troubleshoot it as a technical problem. So suffers the geek.
Of course, it’s always possible that her schedule got shifted or that she just has absolutely no interest in replying to me. But if that were the case, then why would she have given me her e-mail address in the first place?
See, ladies? It’s not only guys who don’t call when they say they will. So there.
This sort of reminds me of a series of events that seems to define the… the… well, the complete strangeness that is my dating life. Years ago, when I still worked in the film business, I went to a wrap party at a house over in Hollywood. At the time, I was much more of a wallflower than I am now and so, as at most parties, I found myself in the kitchen, nursing a drink, and talking in the size group that I can handle (i.e. not the 30 people in the living room).
At some point I started talking to a really interesting woman. She was about my age, redheaded, good looking (not a model, which I find unappealing, but my kind of good looking) and smart as a whip. Yes, intelligence really is a turn on to some of us guys. (Though boobies are nice too. Tee Hee.)
So I talk to this girl for a couple of hours at the party, we exchange numbers and she wants me to call her. The next day or the day after (I don’t remember), I do so.
And the reaction is, and I’m paraphrasing here:
“And you are….?”
“And I know you from…?”
“And I would want to talk to you because…?”
Plainly, she’s no longer interested. So I hang up, feel a slight pang of disappointment, and blow the whole thing off.
A month later, I’m at another party up in The Valley at an apartment building. Whole different show, but some of the crew is the same and, well, whadd’ya know, there she is again. She starts talking to me, so I shrug my shoulders internally and figure maybe last time I reached her on a bad day. Eventually we end up sitting next to the apartment building’s pool talking for a couple of hours.
We exchange numbers again.
She invites me to call again.
You can see where this is going, can’t you?
“And you are…?”
I’ve never been exactly clear what happens in this sort of situation. Am I attractive in person, but turn into an ugly ogre over the phone (and now, quite possibly, over e-mail)? Am I witty conversationalist in person, but turn into a drooling moron when I’m in another location? Interestingly, having always had the thin, non-beefcake geek figure, I’ve always assumed that I would be more attractive using words rather than physical appearance, but now I’m not so sure.
Or, perhaps women just do it to confuse me.
That story, the good/bad, hot/cold, utterly weird situation, well, that’s how much of my dating life has been. Not outward, clear rejection, though it was certainly rejection.
Unfortunately, none of this answers my original query: do I write The Nurse again?
I probably will, for two reasons:
1) She’s leaving town in a few months, so who the hell cares.
and
2) I’m a damn fool.
The GeekHiker 