Memoir Monday: Think, Think, Feel

One of the biggest problems with people, in my view, is that they feel when they should think, and they think when they should feel. I usually don't have the first problem, but boy, am I susceptible to the second. Fortunately – very fortunately – I started getting over it Halloween 1998.

I met Dan when I was twenty-eight, at a poetry reading in which I had for some reason consented to participate. I don't like much poetry, I don't write much of it, and up to that point had never inflicted my own on an unsuspecting world, but I was flattered to be asked. Unbeknownst to me, the dude who organized the reading had an ulterior motive for inviting me; namely, to meet a friend of his he'd also invited. This friend was Italian-looking and hot in a long, leather trench coat, and he very graciously complimented me on the poem I'd read, which was entitled "Blades." (I'll post it someday, if I can dig it up.)

The three of us repaired to a coffee shop afterwards, where Dan and I were able to chat while I ran Dan through my mental potential boyfriend check-list.

Grad student = good earning potential (+1)
Computer science major = intelligence PLUS good earning potential (+2)
Writer = creative tendencies (+1)
Lived locally = no long-distance problems (+1)
Hot-looking = hot-looking (+1)

When Dan revealed he was five years younger, however, my man-assessing algorithm dutifully churned out a result:

Younger = being second to reach every life milestone: turning thirty, getting backaches after exercise, becoming unable to get through medical underwriting (-15)

If you're counting, that worked out to -9, so I filed Dan away in the "just friends" cabinet and moved on…or tried to. Dan was not so easily filed away. When I showed up for the swing dancing lessons a local club was holding Monday nights, who was there? Dan. And since I did not have a partner, he graciously offered to stand in. My mental check-list ahemed:

Good dancer = good in bed (+1)

When others remarked on how moon-eyed Dan got when he looked at me, my checklist reminded:

Moon-eyes = emotional accessibility (+1)

My boyfriend-meter still read -7, however, until that Halloween saw me at a bar where there was to be a costume contest hosted by the Maneater from Manayunk, Stella. When I found out Dan knew Stella personally, my check-list pinged:

Likes Halloween = likes Halloween (+1)
Knows cool people = is cool person (+1)

I entered – and lost – the costume contest, and as I was preparing to leave the club with the friends I'd driven, Dan seized the moment and me, and socked it to me with a Casablanca kiss. My check-list chattered:

Good kisser + hot + smart + sweet = put away goddammed checklist and do something that just feels good for a change

And so I did, and still do.