Things Consumed

 

Youthful Seduction Efforts Gone Awry.

We watched the movie The Winter Guest out of affection for Emma Thompson and interest in what Alan Rickman might be like as a director. One of the four sets of relationships in the film is between a girl who forcefully gets the attentions of a boy, and that same day he decides he really wants to spend some quality time alone at home with her... and then becomes very confused.

I enjoyed that part of the story too much, because it was a slight variation of something that happened to me in college. So much intensity, leading only to panic and disappointment. I know people like to idealize young love... But those people are just misguided: for me and many friends, young love sucked rocks. Let me tell you a silly tale of a week and a half or so of young love in my distant youth:

Failed Seduction One: One weekend in college, I was reintroduced to the man who had grown up from being the sweetest boy in 5th grade. He'd adored me in 5th grade (I knew, because his mother took me aside at the time and told me so). I had adored him. (This is all relative - it was just 5th grade.) And yes, he appeared to be just as adorable in college - but taller and less boyish. We spent the day learning that we had loads of geek activities in common. (We played the same role-playing games! We loved the same anime! Etc.! These things that were relevant at that time to geeks like us.) Yet, he was also charming. We exchanged numbers; we had excited phone conversations; he asked me out.

We spent a bright and sunny day wandering around the City together as our first official date. He was remarkably attentive, extremely pleasant, and very flirtatious. He was great company. He kept speculating about our romantic near-future, which was promising. But he was a terrible tease: his speculation ranged well into his plans for our physical romantic near future. By the evening, he was suggesting that, if we got along so very well after making a fast re-acquaintance, imagine how well we would get along... in bed. Every hour came a new promise of unspecified, wonderful things he would do with me, and to me, given some time alone with me.

The day wore on, and we wound up at his mother's flat. No one else was home. We chatted on the couch, and again came his teasing about having time alone with me - in that very apartment. In the bedroom.

So many words! There we were, alone. We'd held hands; conversation had flowed so easily. He was all smiles and enthusiasm. Somehow, I suspected his florid plans were just bravado. But... I have always been a curious girl. (In multiple meanings of the word.) I had to know. So I pointed out that we were, in fact, alone, and that the aforementioned bedroom was less than thirty seconds away. And? He smiled. He led me back to the bedroom. We lay down, he put his hands on me, we kissed... And about ten seconds later, twenty at most, with all of our clothing still safely fastened, he said that this relationship (?) was moving too fast for him, and he really just wanted to talk some more. He pulled out a sketchbook and showed me some drawings. We discussed his favorite supermodel. And then his mother came home, and I had a great conversation with her (in the living room) for quite a while. I went home, after telling my charming male friend that I would be out of town for a week or so on vacation, but that I'd love to spend some more time with him upon my return.

That was similar to the film in certain ways. The next one I bring up because it happened just a few days later, and because it serves as a delay to the finale of that tale.

Failed Seduction Two: A few days later, while wondering why the sweet boy from 5th grade was so skittish after so much teasing, I found myself on an airplane headed for a Hawaiian vacation with two male friends, and the sister of one of the guys. It was supposed to be a 3-gal, 1-guy trip, but my (girl)friend had dropped out at the last minute, and one of my guy chums filled her place.

I did not realize that I was stumbling into an ill-fitted trap. The guy who had planned this trip, a college classmate of mine who had been dancing with me and my (girl)friend in nightclubs regularly, had booked all the reservations. In each and every hotel, he had made the same arrangements without my knowledge: he reserved a room with one big bed to share with me, and booked a room with two separate beds for his sister and my (girl)friend.

Now, at this juncture, you should know that we had not dated. We had not held hands. We had not kissed. We had not had discussions that would lead to any of those things. We were just friends and classmates who liked to go to the same nightclubs. There was no frigging way I was going to sleep in a bed with this guy just because he made reservations this way. His brain was not engaged when he hatched this seduction plan, but he apparently thought it was a great idea.

Having my male chum along complicated things fabulously. Because there was no way that his sister was going to share a room with my male chum, whom she had never met. Nor would she share a bed with her brother so I could share the separate-bed rooms with my chum. (I don't recall my chum being asked his opinion.) So, despite this guy's plans, I shared the separate-bed rooms with his sister, and he shared the single bed rooms with my male chum.

Male chum, and you know who you are, I am still so sorry that you had to bear the brunt of his comically scripted seduction plan. I really am. The trip was difficult in several ways - traveling is always difficult with friends (including me!), but this circumstance certainly made it more difficult in orders of magnitude.

On the bright side, you created my most vivid memory from that trip: it is the conversation in which you were explaining the situation about the "reservation mix up" to your parents on the phone, when I recall you said "It's okay, because [silly guy] doesn't like his boys smooth. [Long pause] I said, he doesn't like his boys smooth. [Long pause.]" Just imagining your parents' confusion on the other end of that phone line... *giggle* [sound of additional giggles suppressed violently] If I'd had any idea, I wouldn't have dragged you into it. (Nor would I have gone.)

*

There are two punch lines to this story of misdirected seduction planning.

I was only gone a week, but Guy1 was dating someone else by the time I returned from Hawaii. Presumably, this someone was a nice girl who wouldn't kiss him - or demand that he deliver on any of his teasing. *yawn* I never saw him again.

Guy2 worked up the nerve to ask me to date him a semester or so later. He became a very solid, reliable boyfriend for 3 years, and a wretched, workaholic, absentee boyfriend for another 3. (Hindsight is so damned clear!)

All of this rambling is posted here because of my sympathy with a facial expression that the girl in the movie makes, an expression which wasn't as exaggerated as my own was in real life, but which appeared to say All this trouble, for this? Which summarized my most 'social' dating years in one, slightly stunned facial gesture.

Labels: too much information

posted by Arlene (Beth)9:38 PM