in the morning I’ll call you

title: wolves (act I and II) – artist: bon iver

I’ve made my fair share of first date faux pas.

The most frequently recurring one has been mushing over some adorable wee person. See, dates happen out in public. With people. Including wee people. Some of those wee people are utterly adorable. And should they make eye contact, I will smile and wave and "awww!" Maybe it’s because my girlfriends with babies are some of my most favorite people. Maybe it’s because I often find kids quite rad. Maybe it’s because this adoration of the littles is relatively newfound and I’m all for basking in it. Whatever the reason(s), usually the people I’m around have known me for some time. They know I do this, that I dig the little people and I will unabashedly squee over their delightful existence. This is a given and they’re down with it.

But… when you’re in the throes of the getting-to-know-you dance with a litany of odd, crazy, desperate and weird tales surrounding such rituals, this sort of thing is inadvisable. And so I’ve had many an evening (sometimes an afternoon, never a morning) spent returning my gaze to the person next to or across from me, only to find sheer terror whirling in their eyes as they try to keep it from bursting out across the entirety of their face. Depending on how the date is going will determine my next move.

Usually it’s something along the lines of clarifying that my biological clock is most certainly NOT ticking like a time bomb and I am NOT on the hunt for a baby daddy, I just find kids to be some pretty nifty people. While I’d like to have a couple some day, that day is not today. Or tomorrow. So you can start breathing again. Please. I don’t have CPR certification and my most recent refresher on the process was that episode of The Office where Dwight cuts the face off the CPR dummy. Just another reason why I am not prepared to have children right now.

Then there are those times where it’s not been so bad that it has necessitated bailing, but it is in that land where it’s become obvious you’re not even on the same chapter, let alone the same page. And, if you’re honest with yourself, you’re currently weighing if you have enough in you to both continue on out of politeness AND talk them down off their panic-y ledge. Sometimes there’s energy to be conserved. There, I said it.

Then there was that time, as the date was wrapping up and the fella was summing it up in the form of what a recap related to a friend would sound like, "Well, first, she told me she was on it…"

I have a very valid reason for having told my date that I was experiencing "girly time" (yes, I totally said "girly time" when I told him). We’d met up at one establishment and were discussing the potential of going to dinner. When I’d related that I was only kind of hungry (because he’d asked if I was hungry), he asked if I was one of those girls that had dinner before or after and only ate half a salad on a date. Since I do not lie, and I am not one of those girls, but it was very possible I’d be eating only half a salad, plus, at that juncture, I didn’t know if there was going to come a point I was going to want to head home and curl around some heat source, I let him know I’d popped some pills before I came and why and that if I ate only half a salad, it wasn’t because of him.

But, upon hearing the recap, thinking it was an isolated incident, I suddenly realized that it was, in fact, not. I have done this before. Usually for similar reasons, and, thankfully, usually on a second date. But, honestly, it wasn’t the first time this information had been shared on a first date.

These are obvious topics to avoid, though, right? Or at least tread around carefully. And at least I didn’t ever start out a date by saying, "Hey! Guess what? I’m totally ovulating right now!" You know, sometimes it’s all about the small victories.

But there’s this one topic that has surprised me with its volatility every time I’ve brought it up: musicals.

While musicals have long existed, and with a beloved following, they’ve also had an ebb and flow in popular culture. In recent years, their popularity has enjoyed a steady rise. And with that rise, I have become increasingly more aware of the fact that I am just not into them. Don’t get me wrong, under the right circumstances, I can find them great fun. But those circumstances generally don’t involve the cinema or a DVD. Give me a community theatre production, and, ideally, someone I know in it, and I can readily conceive spending my evening with people inexplicably breaking into song. There’s also a possibility that I could dig a professional production, but this is currently an untested hypothesis.

(As an aside: If you are all over, up on, into or around musicals, I am totally stoked for you! Please do not allow my lack of love for this brand of theatre diminish your enjoyment of it in any way.)

I’ve usually had several reasons for bringing up the topic of musicals while on a first date. It’s something to talk about. Also, if this is a potential deal breaker for the other person, I figure it’s best to find out as soon as possible. Additionally, as it’s stereotypically the ladies that love this form of entertainment, and I do not, and the fellas are often trying to come up with lady-pleasing date ideas, I’m hoping to head off a potentially awkward moment in future date plans, should this get-to-know-you dance make it past the first round.

So, I proceed with the inquiry, "How do you feel about musicals?" only to be met with a flash in their eyes, one of panic-stricken horror just a few shades shy of the one I’ve witnessed after an unchecked kiddie encounter. Turns out, this is thought to be a trick question. Or, perhaps these chaps, instead of envisioning the next date involving the unexpected accompaniment of a marriage license and an ordained minister timed to coincide with prime fertility, are now envisioning a future filled with road trips with a non-stop accompaniment of musical soundtracks and the rest of the time a catalogue of impromptu karaoke moments because, "I know the perfect song for this moment!"

So, on more than one occasion, I’ve had to kickstart the relieved breathing with, "I… well, I don’t really get the appeal, personally." But, for that moment, I see that episode of The Office flash before my eyes and I try to recall details more pertinent to CPR than Dwight’s Hannibal Lecter impression set to the tune of Stayin’ Alive.

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