Coming up for air

Who would date this girl? If you’ve ever wondered that, or if you’ve ever wondered why I sometimes refer to some guy named Novio (Spanish for boyfriend), here he is. He loves to talk, and the other day was offering my friend Angie dating advice. I said, "Hey, you’re not bad at this." So I’m giving him the floor.

I have had some of the worst luck when it comes to dating … even when good luck comes my way, bad luck seems to follow. I meet Pam, amazing girl, gets me in every way. I then get a job offer that I had really wanted and I just couldn’t back down. Now I am in a cross-continental relationship. Life is funny isn’t it?

I wasn’t expecting to get a job offer in another country. I went to an international teaching job fair February 2007 and didn’t get any offers. In April, I met Pam, who gets me in every way, and life was great.

Then in May got an e-mail from a school in Manizales, Colombia, with a position available in my subject area. I applied for the job and spent the next two weeks waiting to hear back and trying to decide if I wanted the position or not. On May 25 I got a phone call in the morning. It was my new boss asking me if I wanted the job. Pam was actually there at the time. It was the weird to look at her, a girl I always wanted, and make a decision that was going to put me far away. I decided to take the chance and here I am. Luckily, she was supportive.

So what’s it like on long distance dating? Hmmm. … well, it’s interesting. It makes the moments you have with the person that much more special. At the same time, in the downtime your imagination can run wild. Especially when that person is telling you that they are going out drinking. Not yours truly of course, because, ahem, I never drink, especially not when there’s an amply supply of cheap beer available.

Sometimes I look at advice columns for help to cope with the situation.

Dating columns are interesting to me. They are interesting because I often wonder if the authors of the columns are able to follow their own advice. I am great at giving advice. I should have a syndicated column in which I get paid oodles of money to tell people things that they really already know. Would I follow any of that advice? Heck no!

For example, one of my most frequent mistakes was that I got too excited/infatuated with a girl when I first met her. I would become one of those annoying people we all know who’s so happy because someone finally noticed them. So I would call too much, or want to see the girl way too much. For some that might have been OK, but for others that was a big huge sign that said: “Run Away!”

The irony of that is I have given people advice saying that they should take it slow in the beginning and not get too wrapped up in it. I think of the scene in “Tommy Boy” that expresses this idea best:

Tommy: Hey, what’s your name?

Helen: Helen.

Tommy: That’s nice, you look like a Helen. Helen, we’re both in sales. Let me tell you why I suck as a sales man. Let’s say I go into a guy’s office, let’s say he’s even remotely interested in buying something. Well then I get all excited. I’m like Jojo the idiot circus boy with a pretty new pet. Now the pet is my possible sale. Hello there pretty little pet, I love you. And then I stoke it, and I pet it, and I massage it. Hehe I love it, I love my little naughty pet, you’re naughty. And then I take my naughty pet and I go (makes ripping noises as he tears apart the roll)

Tommy: Uuuuuuh. I killed it. I killed my sale. And that’s when I blow it. That’s when people like us have gotta forge ahead, Helen. Am I right?

Helen: God, you’re sick.

So yeah. I would meet a girl, like a girl, get wrapped up in the girl, and then girl would stop answering my calls. Damn you caller I.D.!

Then of course I would spend the next couple of weeks telling myself I wasn’t going to do that again.

We’ve all been there though, on one side of the situation or the other. It’s never easy.

I’ve been on dates that I thought went great, but I never heard from the girl again. I’ve also been on dates with girls when I wasn’t sure if things went well or not.

That’s when I would get really crazy. I went on a date in college with a girl, whom I liked but wasn’t sure if she liked me. I decided that I was going to write a note, slip it under her dorm room door, and then run like hell.

I couldn’t do it by myself, so I had a friend go with me. We go to her room, slide it under the door, and then run away like we had stolen something. Fortunately I only got the “I only want to be friends” phone call rather than, “You are not to come with 50 feet of me” phone call.

Yeah. College was interesting. I was a late bloomer relationship-wise so I got a crash course in dating in a relatively short amount of time. My college friends tried to help me, they really did. Unfortunately, one must learn by mistakes in the world of dating. I kept making the same mistakes over and over again. I think infatuation and lust are like drugs. You never think straight when you are infatuated. Like any drug when you crash … it hits you hard.

So my girlfriend is writing a dating column. I guess that is a good thing. It keeps me on my toes. Just think, I am one big screw-up away from having my business plastered for everyone to see, and I wouldn’t be called “Novio” anymore. My name, social security number, and mother’s maiden name would be there as well. It might be a good idea to invest in more flowers.