It’s 4:03 pm. Where is she? I hear the door to the coffee shop swing open. I turn to see if it is my date. A tall brunette in a mini-skirt walks in. Please let that be her. She walks to the line to order a coffee. I examine her face to see if it matched her profile. Damn, it’s not her.
I take a deep breath and sip my coffee. I notice I’m tensed up just sitting there waiting for some random girl that I know nothing about. Relax. Open up the body language. Lean back. Relax the shoulders. Good.
It’s 4:09 pm. The door opens again. I feel a lump in my throat. Is it her? Yes, it is. I recognize the face immediately from her profile. She is cute, cuter than I expected. She looks over and spots me. I throw up my hand and wave her over.
“Uh, hi. Jasmine?” I say extending my hand
“Yea, you must be Matt” she says while lightly shaking my hand
“I just got my coffee, so why don’t you go and grab one and then we can chat, ok?” I say
“Yea, ok”
She heads over to order while I wait. She looks nervous. I’m nervous. This is nothing like meeting a woman in a bar. How the hell am I supposed to play this?
I’ve never had a date through the Internet before. The closest I’ve got from getting a date was from my CraigsList experiment. I ended up getting a phone number out of it but the girl never returned my call.
Unlike the CraigsList experiment, the lead up to this date was much different. First, Jasmine was the one who initiated the interaction by “poking” me. Second, since she made first contact I could make the assumption that there was already attraction. Third, because there was attraction I could be a bit more direct and move things along much quicker. With these points in mind, I was able to go from a couple of flirting emails to suggesting we meet up for coffee in only four email messages. She agreed.
It’s 4:12 pm. Jasmine rejoins me and sits down with her coffee. Her body language is immediately closed off. Arm crossed in front of chest. Legs and feet pointing away from me. Eyes avoiding my gaze. This going to be tough. I need to get her to relax and open up.
“So, uh, did you have any trouble finding this place?” I ask
“Oh no, I’ve been here before.” she says
“Oh nice. It’s a good place isn’t it? I really like it.” I say
“I guess it’s ok.” she says dryly
There is an awkward pause. This is going terrible already. Ugh, what do I do? Her eyes aren’t even looking at me. She just keeps looking at everything in the shop except me. Alright Matt, pull yourself together, you’re a freaking seduction artist for Christ sake. Seduce her!
“Hey, let me get your female opinion on something?” I ask
“Um, ok”
“You know how if I guy wants to be gentleman, he opens the door for woman?”
“Yea”
“Ok, well what are you supposed to do at a revolving door?” I ask
“Hehe, I don’t know, that’s a good question, I guess you just let her go first.” she says
“Hmm, interesting, well do you like funny stories?” I ask
“Yes”
The ice is now broken. From here I launch into a story about a hilarious incident where I accidentally got stuck in the same compartment of a revolving door with a beautiful woman. She laughs at the story and we discuss the various scenarios of revolving door etiquette. It’s enough to avoid the awkward pauses and move the interaction into the comfort phase. Her body language shows that she is opening up more.
It’s 4:33 pm. We’ve been talking about random things for a solid twenty minutes now. This is the point where Jasmine decides to barrage me with a million questions. She rattles the questions off like it was an interview. I am getting uncomfortable. What do you? Do you like your work? Where are you from? Where is your family from? Do you have any siblings? What kind of music do you like? What do you eat? Where do you see yourself in five years? Etc.
It’s 4:49 pm. I can’t take this anymore. Though she’s been asking some reasonable questions, the conversation has become completely boring despite my attempts to either keep things light and funny or go into deep rapport. She won’t back down either. The questions just keep coming one after another. Oh my god, my ears are falling off, please make it stop.
I interrupt in mid question, “Hey, we should go for a walk. It’s nice outside.”
“Um, yea ok” she agrees
Phew. Finally I catch a break. But now I have to figure out the next step. We leave the coffee shop and head out to the sidewalk.
“There is a nice little pond right around the corner. We could go take a walk around the pond?” I suggest
“Naw”
“Uh, ok. Well there are some nice shops down the street, we can go check those out?”
“No. Actually, I think I’m going to get going now. I have to be somewhere at 5:30.” she says
“Oh ok, um well….” I’m stumbling on how to end the interaction
“You don’t need to walk me back or anything. It was nice meeting you.” she says
“It was nice meeting you too. Maybe we can hang out again sometime.” as I shake her hand
“Uhhh, yea, maybe.” she says as she turns around and walks away
It’s 4:55 pm. It’s over. I turn and walk in the other direction to head back home. The interaction didn’t go well, but it was a good learning experience in regards to coffee dates. I don’t think I’ll be hearing back from her. The whole thing was just weird.
