Dating: The Double-Yellow Line Between Being Considerate And Being A Tool
The Los Angeles Times published a series of lame dating pieces, and this is one of them. A guy who seems to be a Mattel toy designer has a Tinder date. This is a dead giveaway that he’s the sort of man who gets walked on.
She said she lived in Beverly Hills. I suggested meeting at Urth Caffe so it would be convenient for her. What I didn’t say is that I live in Santa Monica and I work in El Segundo, which meant making it to Beverly Hills on a weekday would be absolute torture.
In other words, he bends over backward — and then some — for a total stranger. To the point where he goes through hours of hell in LA traffic.
It’s great to be a guy who’s considerate and who goes the extra mile — once you have a girlfriend with an open heart who’ll do the same for you.
But you can’t just change the behavior; you have to change what’s behind it — probably some combo of dating out of your league and not having fixed whatever makes you feel all “I’m not worthy! I’m not worthy!”
Or this is what happens to you:
The drive took almost two hours. Still, I found parking and made it to Urth with 10 minutes to spare. When I arrived, however, I got a message telling me she was actually about two miles away, at the SLS Hotel on La Cienega Boulevard. She was there getting her hair done “for tomorrow’s shoot” and asked if I wanted to meet there instead. It was going to be either a 30-minute drive in traffic or a 20-minute walk, so I decided to keep my parking spot and headed on over.
I messaged when I reached the hotel, and she told me she still needed about 10 minutes. I said I’d be at the hotel bar.
Thirty minutes later … she texted that she was “still getting worked on.”
Fifteen minutes later (about an hour and a half since I arrived in Beverly Hills, and over three hours since I left my job), she messaged that she was on her way down.
She looked good, not amazing, but like her photos. I complimented her hair and went in for a friendly hug. She responded with a light, impersonal and slightly awkward embrace.
She looked at me and said, “You look nothing like your pictures!,” to which I responded “You mean in a good way, I hope.”
She just looked down.
I asked if she wanted to go back to Urth. She said “You’re welcome to walk back and I’ll meet you there,” which I now realize was her first try at an exit strategy.
I suggested we just stay in the lobby for drinks. I began with some small talk, including asking why she’s new to Tinder.
“Well, I just broke up with my boyfriend. Actually we broke up last month, but just stopped sleeping together this week. Like yesterday.”
OK …
The guy blames the fact that she’s a lingerie model/actress/whatever.
Okay, sure, maybe she’s looking for somebody richer or famous-er or whatever, but even if he dates girls who aren’t looking for that, his problem will remain. (And no, it probably doesn’t help that he’s probably dating out of his league.)
But his real problem? It’s not that he’s a nice guy; it’s that he’s a pathetic guy who shows women he’ll do anything to get them.
As I write in my book, first dates should be three things: Cheap, short, and local. And that’s local for all involved, meaning you meet in the middle. You don’t haul your ass through a traffic jungle so she won’t have to muss her hair behind the wheel.
This says everything about you — none of it good or helpful for getting a woman to do more than take you for a ride and then push you out the car door after you’re done paying for as much as she can squeeze out of you.
