Blind Date
by Walt
Giersbach
This
isn’t your typical blind date. Dating in the
dark takes the experience to a new level. The
guys are one side and the girls on the other.
They can hear each other, they can learn about
the other participants, but they never see each
other. Visually impaired guys who deal with this
situation every day lead the participants through
the event. (CNN feature, Nov. 23, 2009)
I’ve been
doing the online dating thing for awhile—Match,
Nerve, Jdate, OkCupid, you name it. But the most
horrifying experience came from my buddy’s
invitation to join him at a real blind date.
Meeting chicks with the lights off. I was ushered
into a room by a guy with a white cane who told
me my “date” was on the other side of
the table.
“Hi, my
name’s Julie,” a voice said.
“I’m 23, a 5-foot ten blonde, wealthy
and a doctor in neurology—that thing with
the nerves and all.”
“Wait a
minute,” I exclaimed, “what
‘thing’ with the nerves?” Although
not expressly forbidden, I reached across in the
dark to find her hand. I came up with a paw
instead.
“Okay,”
she said,” I’m sorry. You know that bit
about no one really knows you’re a dog when
you’re online? I thought it would apply here
too. I’m really a greyhound trapped in a
German shepherd’s body.”
Next date! I
heard someone sit down as the chair squeaked.
Then a second and third chair squeaked. A plummy
voice said “I’m Ingrid and men say
I’m full of life. My misfortune is being a
slow vehicle in the fast lane.” I detected a
note of Weltschmerz tinged with angst.
“That’s
okay. There are plenty of slow vehicles in the
tunnel of love. Where are the other two girls I
heard?”
“That’s
just me. All of me. I’ve been trying to lose
a pound or two, but my problem’s glandular.”
Oh my God, I
thought. She meant her salivary glands, and the F
word escaped my lips.
“Well,”
she huffed. “I expected a more articulate
comment! You could have said obese, corpulent,
oleaginous, stout, plump. You could have called
me Gargantuan, a King Kong among queens, Godzilla
suffering a snack attack. A whopper, a thumper, a
hippopotamus, a whale, leviathan. I’m
leaving!”
I slid into a
third chair of opportunity as the facilitator
shouted a three-minute warning. A melodious voice
welcomed me. I sensed the turgid excitement
coursing from her lips. She offhandedly confessed
she acted like a lady in the living room, a
mother in the kitchen and a hooker in the bedroom.
As the seconds flew by, I was on the verge of
jumping over the barrier and gripping her in my
hungry arms.
Then the
lights came up and I was facing my ex
girlfriend—the one who had proven to be a
mother in the bedroom, a lady in the kitchen and
a hooker in the living room.
I don’t
do blind dates anymore.
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