Until I Get Married

All your life you said if ever you were lucky enough to just be in the same room as Tyra Banks, you would take your shot. That’s all you needed was proximity. When you used to have her poster up on the wall in your childhood bedroom, you would talk to the poster and say, “One day, Tyra. One day.” You meant it too, because you knew she always wanted just a regular guy. That’s what she would say in interviews over and over again, “I just want a regular, normal nice guy I can bring home to my Mom.” And you knew you would always be the epitome of normal: an everyday guy who woke up, worked, had a little fun, and took showers on a regular basis just like everyone else.

So the other night, you are at The Darby (a spot I highly recommend for food and drinks), sitting at the bar with one of your boys, enjoying a Manhattan. The place isn’t too crowded. As a matter of fact, it was a rather quiet night in what is currently one of New York City’s most popular eateries. The friend you are with, one of your best friends who has known you for 12 years, knows exactly how you feel about Tyra Banks. He remembers how one year you actually tried to do a paper on the significance of Tyra Banks’ Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition cover but because your professor was a hater, he didn’t allow it, but whatever. That’s all in the past.

You and your friend are having a conversation, about what, you can’t recall and it really doesn’t matter because all of a sudden in walks Tyra Banks. Your friend sees her first, hits you on the shoulder, and says, “Tyra Banks, Tyra Banks, Tyra Banks, dude Tyra Banks!” Before you even can turn around you smell the beauty and then as your head turns, she’s walking right past you, headed straight to a table with some guy we’re just going to name Whatever aka Non Factor.

Now was your chance. Here it was, the moment you had been waiting for your whole life. Tyra Banks sitting at a table approximately 15 steps away from you. Even with Non Factor sitting next to her, if you would be so bold, you could approach the table politely and say hello, and what a big fan of hers you are and that you used to have her posters all up on your wall. You could tell her that she looks just as beautiful in real life as she does in pictures and on television. You could tell her all the things you’ve ever wanted to tell her like how you think Chris Webber is an idiot and no one could love her like you could love her.

But instead, you do the exact opposite. You do nothing. Absolutely nothing. We can count the effort you made to try and not stare at Tyra Banks for an inordinate amount of time, but we won’t. You froze up and tried not to drool on yourself and by the time you came to your senses, and realized you missed the opportunity of a lifetime, Tyra Banks, the woman you’ve loved from afar ever since you knew what love was, was gone.

For Valentine’s Day, every student spent the morning making a heart shaped folder out of paper, then taping it over the side of their desk. After lunch recess, everyone got out their cards they made at home and dropped them in each other’s heart shaped folder. When I saw her drop a card into mine, it took every ounce of restraint I could muster for me to stop what I was doing, dig through my pile of cards, and take hers out.

But I finished handing my cards out, then along with the rest of the class, sat down in my seat. Our teacher said opening could commence, and the sound of second grade hands tearing open paper and crunching stale, chalky Valentine’s Day candy filled the room. I saw hers, pulled it out and set it aside, deciding I would open it last.

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I know I said today’s post would be football term’s for ladies to apply in their dating life, but I’m postponing that topic because something else is on my mind.

This is hard for me to write about without giving some context, bare with me as I unpack a couple of things before moving forward.

I never write about my dad. My late biological father has been written about at length, so has my pop. The man my mother is married to, I refer to him as my step-dad. In my own head, these men are clearly separated and compartmentalized. To the reader, things are probably a little more jumbled, largely because I don’t write about my life in chronological order. I hop around, jumping from memory to memory.

So when I say my dad, understand I am not talking about the men I mentioned above. I am talking about the man whose last name was given to me after he adopted me as his own. He brought my sister into this world. He and my mom were married, but divorced when I was 5 or 6. From then on, he was more of a weekend dad, seeing us about twice a month.

I’ve had my issues with my dad. They’re not as deep as the issues I had with the absence of my biological father or the troubling and complicated relationship I had with my pop, but issues nonetheless. Most of these bore out of how little we saw him even though he never lived too far away. He never raised us so much as he visited us, and there were times my sister and I both resented him for it. The other issue is, how remarkably different he is from my sister and I.

Our dad is a white man from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania who listens to The Doors, wears Wranglers, votes Repubican, loves Pittsburgh sports, the Steelers especially, and watches Nascar. We could not be more opposite if I was night and he, day, which made the physical distance between us feel much farther than it ever really was.

Thankfully, over the years, my issues with him have subsided. We talk most Sundays on the telephone, the conversations mostly brief check-ins, but I am proud to say, occasionally they run long.

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Anybody know if there is an award given to the person who makes the worst movie date choices ever? If so, I’d like to nominate myself for contention.

Considering it was the first date, I really had no business asking the young woman over to my place to watch a movie in the first place. Talk about unoriginal.

But what can I say? I was only 20, making intern money and it was Detroit where I just moved to live for the summer. I knew like three people and knew nowhere to go so a movie at my place was really the best I could offer.

Luckily, she understood all these things so she said yes. I told her all she had to do was show up, I’d handle the rest. I was going to make a great dinner and pick a classic film that I just knew she would love.

Dinner went as planned.

As for the movie? Well, let’s just say, short of something from the Bang Bros series, this was probably the worst movie someone could ever choose on a first date. To this day, I smack myself on the forehead when I think of my selection. Not just because of the movie I selected but because I actually thought the movie I selected was the right movie; like whatever a movie is supposed to do to enhance a date, this was going to do it. She’s gonna love this one I thought.

Well, as it turns out, she…Well, here, the movie poster, a clip, and then below, her reaction to the worst first date movie ever.

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I don’t like to ponder much about the future so much as I like to prepare for whatever it may bring. But sometimes my mind goes there and I smile at the thought of having a family of my own one day. If I’m fortunate enough to have children, I imagine there will be a bunch of things I will tell them about the life I lived before they arrived and the lessons I learned from it.

At times, my daydreams get super specific and I imagine I have a son who comes home from school one day all bent out of shape. You see, there’s a girl he really likes but she doesn’t feel the same way. At this age, he’s far too young to understand the concept of “more fish in the sea”. He hasn’t been around enough girls to know there are so many more he will meet, and of those many, some will like him back and some will like him before he even likes them.

So I will spare him the lecture, because there’s little chance a new girl for him to crush on will walk through his classroom door the next day. Besides all he cares about is the girl he likes. At that moment in his life, she is the one, and not having her is killing him, and since I know what that feels like I will tell him to take it from his old man, that girl, one day, she will be his. Maybe not forever, but one day, she will see in him what he sees in her. I’m sure when I say this to him, he will ask me how I know, and I’ll tell him the story.

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My girlfriend at the time and I took a seat at the bar of a restaurant while waiting for a table to have dinner. When we took our seats, the bartender, a pretty woman who was wearing a spaghetti strapped shirt, jeans, and big hair walked over to us. She laid down two bar napkins in front of us, turned to me and asked me first what I would like to drink.

I thought it was a mistake. In all my years working in restaurants throughout high school and college, one of the paramount rules was women always order first, matter of fact, everything concerning the service requires the woman goes first. This was even more true in fine dining establishments similar to the one where my ex-girlfriend and I were having dinner. I turned to my ex and asked her what she wanted. My ex looked at the bartender and with a slight hint of attitude ordered a mojito. I placed my order and when the bartender went to make our drinks, I asked my ex if everything was okay. She insisted it was but I could tell her woman’s intuition was picking up on something I wasn’t.

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Today’s story feels longer than usual so if you’d like, print it out and take it with you when you have some time to read it in its entirety. Or not. Doesn’t matter. Just a suggestion. Enjoy!

I hope I don’t get arrested for telling this story. Here goes nothing….

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First, some context regarding our relationship.

She was not my girlfriend, but not because I didn’t want her to be and not because she didn’t want to be my girlfriend. The two of us just had complicated lives. When we met, we lived in the same city, but as our luck would have it, her career would take her to D.C., and neither of us saw long distance as an option. So instead, we agreed to keep things open at a distance, but when work put us in the same city or one of us wanted to visit the other, we became each others priority.

The arrangement worked out nicely. We even managed to be open about the other people we were seeing. I was tolerant of her dating stories and she, tolerant of mine. Long as we remained respectful, didn’t reveal any cringe-inducing details, and were honest if feelings for another intensified, we remained in a good place. We respected each other, and trusted each other, so much so, we even let each other stay at our apartments if we were out of town. One time I went to D.C. at the same time she had to be in New York, so I left with her my keys to my place, and she left with me, her keys.

This relationship was, in  a word, ideal. Until she revealed to me a story that made our relationship weird.

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Because, I don’t really have too many thoughts on Valentine’s Day as a Hallmark Holiday. When you’re in a relationship it’s cool and when you’re not it can suck. Whatever. Doesn’t matter to me, so I’ll spare anyone my complete thoughts on the day. Instead, a story of what I can remember was an unexpectedly good Valentine’s Day.

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I suppose I should start by saying everything about this story is true. Jermaine knew about it, because he was the first person I called when it happened. My mom never knew until I told her two nights ago, years after the fact. I couldn’t write this before I shared it with her, but it wasn’t as though I was asking her permission or seeking her approval. What’s done was done. I just wanted to share it with her before I shared it here, out of respect for our relationship.

The other thing I should say is, no matter what your views are on abortion — whether your pro choice or pro life — I share this not to advocate for either side of the issue. Today’s post isn’t motivated by an article I read or some story in the news or something I watched on TV. As a matter of fact, I don’t even know why I’m writing about this other than to write about my life without shame like I always do.

And most importantly, this post is not to pit a man’s experience against a woman’s experience, to say one is more deep than the other. Frankly, I don’t think there’s much of a contest between the two. I have no idea what it’s like to be the woman in this situation, not mentally, not physically. All I know is what it feels like for me, a man.

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