I went on a date a few weeks ago. It was probably the first date I’ve gone on in over a year. It wasn’t awful, but we knew there wouldn’t be a second one. Towards the end of the night, she invited a friend to meet up with us. At one point, while my date was playing pool and maybe flirting with someone else, the friend asked if it was the worst date I’ve been on. I said it wasn’t, but I wouldn’t call it good.
There were a lot of reasons the date fell short. First and foremost, she and I have very different energies. I’d describe her as an active extrovert, where as I’m more of a passive extrovert or an introverted extrovert. She wanted to float around the bar like a butterfly and talk to everyone. I’m usually content talking to whoever happens to sit next to me. She insists on getting the bartender’s attention and talking to them (even when they’re too busy to talk). She did this at the two places we visited. I assume (and can see) the bartenders are busy and usually wait for the bartender to talk to me. Different energies, different approaches to social life. She makes things happen, I wait for thing to happen.
Because she would know too many people if we went out near where she lives and works as a bartender, she suggested we go out in my neighborhood (though she didn’t know it was my neighborhood at the time). I told her, I was fine with that, but would have a similar situation. I know a lot of people in my neighborhood. She suggested I pick a place where I’d run into the fewest people I knew. I did, and I still knew a bartender, a server, and two patrons. We ended the night by going back to my local bar.
Not that I go on a lot of dates, but when I do, I try not to take them to my local bar. It’s like introducing them to my friends too early, or bringing them into my living room. Because she had been to the bar before and had previous conversations with the bar owner, I made an exception. The other reason I don’t bring dates to my bar, is because I don’t want to deal with the raised eyebrows, the lookie-loos, and the eventual ribbing that I’ll get from my friends. When I saw one of my friends two days later, he said something along the lines of “well that was a lot” or “she was a handful.” Again, different wavelengths and mismatched energy.
What I need to learn to do on these dates is find a non-evasive way to shut down questions and/or conversations about past relationships…. or at the very least, better identify who might weaponize such conversations. I don’t shut them down because I am, or at least I think I am, an open book (shit, someone could easily find this blog and read all about them). There are very few questions that are off the table and pleading the fifth would feel suspect. Yet, the last two times past relationships have come up on dates (including this date), the conversations didn’t go particularly well. They were often one-sided in terms of curiosity and sympathy. When my date(s) would talk about their relationships (sometimes in unflattering terms), I’d listen with a sympathetic ear. If they cast too much blame, I’d listen and maybe mentally take that in with some skepticism. If they seem to take some ownership, I see them as a person who understands nuance. In both instances, when I talked about my past relationships and tried to acknowledge where I could have done better, my dates became judgmental 9critical of the decisions I made the actions I took).
In this most recent instance, my date seemed to want agreement from me that she was on the right side of history in her last big relationship… he love-bombed her, he was manipulative, he was dismissive, he was narcissistic, etc. etc. etc. She said very little about her role in their dance, said very little about what she could have done differently or better. This was the first time we had talked about these things. As such, I could only take her at her word. Maybe he was narcissistic or dismissive. I tried to talk about my relationships (marriage, engagement, and the only one after the engagement) with more nuance. I don’t find much value in passing blame, and tend to think a lot of good relationships fail from good intentions gone wrong, or bad timing, or circumstance, or miscommunication. For a nice little essay on the many ways we could be right for each other and still not be right for each other, check out “If a birds falls in love with a fish, where will they live?” I shared with her that I haven’t dated much in the six or seven years since my last big one in which I had gotten engaged. She shared that she’s never been married, or engaged. She’s never had anything that lasted longer than 8 months.
She was most curious about the engagement that didn’t work out. As I told my version, she interrupted me often. She said I missed a bunch of red flags. She said I proposed too early in the relationship and also at the wrong time (when my partner was dealing with potential medical issues). In this, she stopped just short of accusing me of emotional manipulation – suggesting that I asked knowing my partner was desperate for support. I had never even considered that as a way of interpreting events. I said that wasn’t my intention, said that I proposed in the spirit of “we got this beat, we’re in this together, and even in a worst-case scenario, I’m not going anywhere.” She said that only reinforces that it was manipulation. I felt like I was being attacked, or at the very least that she was projecting some of her experiences on to me. At which point, I said no, not only did my partner bring up marriage first, but she wasn’t without a voice… she could have said she wasn’t in a good place to discuss… she could have suggested that we get through the potential crisis first and then talk about engagement. It takes two to tango.
She pushed to see if I had learned anything from this. When I said, I don’t have any regrets, and that I followed my heart at the time, and that I don’t think I could have done it any differently, she took that to mean that I believed I didn’t do anything wrong and suggested that I was unwilling to take accountability. I countered by saying I believe most people try to do the best they can with the tools they have at their disposal. When she said I should have seen that my ex had a dismissive attachment type, I said maybe, but I’m not so sure. To this she said, “you still haven’t learned anything, you’re really gong to defend a failed relationship – shouldn’t that be proof that it wasn’t going to work?” I hate this type of argumentation – because something didn’t work doesn’t mean it would have never worked – or perhaps it worked, but was only meant to be brief. I reminded her that everything I’m saying now is with hindsight – in the moment, we’re supposed to see the best in our partners… good and honest relationships extend both grace and the benefit of the doubt. In those relationships you should be looking for green flags and reasons you’ll succeed as opposed to red flags and reasons you’ll fail. I suppose I’m an optimist, or at least I still want to be one.
At some point in the dating process, talking about past relationships is unavoidable. Moreover, doing so can provide good insights into how a person views relationships and takes accountability. The challenge, of course, is to remain open – to see the other person in as non-judgemental a way as possible. In fact, I think this is where physical attraction or humor or any host of other things that draw us to someone else may be beneficial… may help us see past what we might otherwise interpret as warning signs. If there was one core reason that this particular date would never go anywhere, it was because she didn’t assume the best of me – she jumped to judgement. Assuming the best in others and believing that they act with good intentions, especially early on, means liking them enough to believe their story.
The problem with the “red flags” conversations is that they train us to think of relationships as learning experiences to carry forward with us into whatever comes next. They train us to be cautious and closed-off as opposed to open and inviting. They tend to treat past relationships as mistakes instead of honest attempts to connect with people. I don’t see the world that way. I don’t view any of my big relationships (ones in which I was emotionally daring enough to believe there was love between us) as a mistake. Doing so (being on the lookout for red flags), results in being jaded and distrusting towards others, and few good things can start, much less thrive, in distrust.
When a female friend, who was surprised that I even went on a date, asked how it went, I said, it was weird and that my date seemed critical of my past relationships. I didn’t share any of the exchange with my friend just that it was strange for a person who doesn’t know me very well and has never been engaged or married to tell me that I did it wrong. She agreed that it was strange but applauded me for putting myself out there.
I admit, I’m clumsy in these conversations. In my efforts to avoid being critical of past partners, I try really really hard to speak in neutral terms. In doing so, I intentionally leave lots of things out, like mentioning that getting engaged was a precondition for my partner when it came to living together. I leave details out because I’m not expecting to be judged and having made peace with things, I have little interest in trying to “prove my case.” In fact, on the better dates that I’ve had, the ones that turned into relationships, we both offered a type of blind trust in what the other person had said. We liked each other enough to not look for fault on those early dates.
I’m not as practiced at this as I used to be. As such, I’m more inclined to shrink back from a negative experience than I am to pick myself up, dust myself off, and try again. If I go months between dates, it’s because the less than ideal ones, the ones in which the other person lacks curiosity, or worse is judgemental, leave a bad taste in my mouth… leave me feeling lost in an unsympathetic, jaded, and closed-off dating world.
In the end, I’m beginning to believe that it’s the construct that’s a big part of the problem. I’m beginning to believe that because it’s labeled as a date, both people approach knowing there’s information to gather: factual information like where are you from, what music and movies do you like, along with emotional information – tell me about your past. The best dates, and it’s been a while since I’ve had one of these, seem to take care of some of this fact finding before the date (text messages mixed with flirting) and navigate the in-person meeting with ease, humor, and mutual curiosity. Those seem rare, but I suppose all one can do is try.