Tag: dating

Chick lit

~ Chris ~ Leave a comment

“The idea of meeting someone in a library, in the aisle of a bookstore or while reading on the subway, for instance, remains stubbornly high on the list of many people’s romantic fantasies.” — from The New York Times (link below) 

I admit there are few things more alluring to me than an attractive woman reading a book or browsing in (or working at) a book shop or library. It’s a smashing combo, a kind of electrifying alchemy that I can’t quite explain.

For instance, in the 1946 noir “The Big Sleep,” I’ve always been partial to the bespectacled bookshop proprietress played by Dorothy Malone than to Bogart’s famous glamor squeeze Lauren Bacall — a nerdy example of my bookish bent.

My personal history of amore is lucky with literature. There was blue-eyed Guen, who brought on our first date a copy of David Mamet’s “Writing in Restaurants,” just for me. Laura, who made my knees buckle from afar, was toting the poems of Herman Hesse (we were soon a couple).

One of my biggest crushes was on the girl who worked at the hippest book store in Austin. Then there was the woman who, after a little wine, insisted we go browse the local used book store and buy each other a volume. Now we’re talking.

On the flip-side, I once invited a date to my place. She looked around at the Rothko print and various vintage movie posters, all without comment. Then she eyed my bookshelves and scoffed, “You have way too many books.” Deal-breaker!

Like movies, books are crucial to me, and a shared passion for them is just that — shared passion. It’s something in common, hot to the touch, and can be the bedrock of something more intense, meaningful and feverish.

All this was stirred up reading the above mentioned story in the Times titled “Is Reading the Hottest Thing You Can Do as a Single Person?” (Answer: yes.) 

Check it out HERE.

Dorothy Malone, bookshop owner, face to face with Bogart in “The Big Sleep”

Money can’t buy me love

~ Chris ~ 6 Comments

When I was 14, gangly and clueless, a fellow teen approached me in line for the Big Thunder Mountain rollercoaster at Disneyland. She was cute, shy and giggly, and she slipped me a piece of paper the size of a business card. A shiny dime was taped to the card, which read: “Here’s my number and a dime, you can call me anytime.” 

Hot damn! 

(Less hot: I probably still have this ego-tickling keepsake. What a sap.)

(Lesser hot: The lass was surely carrying several cards around like a rod and reel, fishing for quarry at a teeming amusement park. The indignity.)

If only that’s how things worked in this era of high-tech, horn-dog delivery systems. To hell with Match and Tinder, just hand me your card with a proposition and I’ll take it from there. Prepaid to boot, though I’m sure a dime won’t slice it anymore. Tape a fifty-spot to it and we can talk. 

Though I prefer the above messaging — or, equally effective, the hand-passed mash note in Spanish class — I have resorted to dating sites, if only thrice, to make my intentions known. Each time was met with lavish failure. They just didn’t work out, making me a member of about 20 million date-site suckers.  

There was the young woman on Yahoo!, a dark beauty with cotton-candy cheeks, who advertised herself as an inveterate reader and energetic world traveler, only to prove she’s a deft fabulist and convincing embellisher. 

We met up for drinks and jabber. I asked what she reads and she said Harry Potter (watch my face drop). I press. No, just Harry Potter. We never discussed what I’m reading. Travel? She’s been to New York, once, with her mother. And Canada. The tryst was a bust. Even more so, as she’s a fiend for top-shelf vodka. 

Later, I tried trés-hip hookup hotbed OkCupid. I contacted two women. My gentlemanly overtures — the meek shall not inherit the earth — fetched zero responses. I had no idea what I was doing. Still, I was crestfallen for about 17 minutes.  

I believe in fate, kismet, stuff happening for a reason. Actually I don’t, but stick with me. I had a distant, tormenting crush on a woman who worked at the local arthouse cinema. She didn’t notice me. 

One day, at my favorite outdoor cafe, I spotted her (alone, gripping a Hermann Hesse paperback; be still my beating heart). As if the heavens split, she saw me and we exchanged incandescent smiles. I wish, right there, I had a business card that said, “Here’s my number — just call me!” 

Forget the goddam dime. Life is cheap, and short; love’s even cheaper, and shorter. Loose change has no place in this picture. (I later learned that this melting vision, named Laura, didn’t own a cell phone, just as I didn’t. I should have handed her the card with a roll of quarters and a money order.)  

I was paralyzed, besotted, nerves ajangle. So close, I thought. Make a move, putz!

I shot her a few more smiles, and, helpless about what to do next — approach her? sure! — I got in my car. As I pulled away, we made final eye contact, smiled and waved at each other. I ached with yearning, dramatically misty-eyed.

That’s because this was the classic, tragic missed opportunity. And yet with some tactful sleuthing, I figured it out: I discovered her name, got permission to call her (trusty land line), and soon wound up at her place watching “About a Boy” on VHS. We were a solid couple — books, travel, beer — for more than a year. Not an epoch, but enough time for the earth’s plates to shift.

Success, without a dating service, without a dime taped to a brazen call-me card, without exaggerated CVs and eye-fluttery flirtation — it happens. And it’s the only way I’ll play the dating game. Chance, fate — I don’t believe in them. But sometimes, rarely, it all falls into place. And I cherish that, for it’s no dime a dozen.