Dating Chronicles: Ice Queen ❄️

This story takes place over the period of about a year and it starts in the fall of 2016. I've just moved to Louisville and started taking classes at Southern Seminary. Still single at this point, and being a guy, and mostly having guy friends, as a group you notice the young ladies that are also single and attractive in your immediate area.

Some of my friends think they have identified the most attractive girl on campus, but due to missed opportunities, bad timing, or just random chance: I am never with my friends when they see this girl. Naturally, every time they say that they have seen her, I ask if they have talked to her. The answer is always no. I state, very plainly I might add, that whenever they see this girl next, and if I am with them, I will talk to this girl and get to know her.

Now at this point in my life, I'm a bit older, a bit wiser, and I would like to think a bit more comfortable with who I am. If I want to meet and talk with someone, I'll go up and introduce myself and talk to them. By no means do I think that I am God's gift to women. I am simply confident in who I am and if I get rejected, I can let it roll off of my back.

One day, my friends and I are throwing baseball in the J Bowl (a large grassy area at the center of campus), and my friends point to me that the girl is walking by. I wave, ask her name, and we become friends. Simple as that. She is a really cool girl and we have great chemistry. We actually become really good friends, and I hesitate to ask her out because I am not sure if I am willing to risk losing such a cool friend. Not to mention, she is very attractive and every other dude is slobbering all over her to try and get a date with her...and that's not me.

Fast forward a year and we are still friends. We hang out on campus, share in what we are learning in classes, and bond over good music, food, things that make us laugh, and what we want out of life in the future.

One day, I see her on campus, and as friends do I walk up and talk to her. She then asks, "Do you like me?"
Honestly, I was shocked at how forward and blunt she was, so to give myself more time to think I asked for clarification, "What do you mean?"
But she didn't hesitate, "Do you like me?"
So I told her honestly, "I've thought about it, but I didn't know how you were going to respond, so that's why I haven't asked."
She thoughtfully answered, "Well, if you were going to ask me, I think I would say yes."
Quite the turn of events in the past few minutes. Hardly believing if she is joking with me or not, I remember that fortune has always favored the bold, so I asked her, "Will you go on a date with me?"
She smiles, "Yeah, I would really like that."

We set the date to get coffee. We then go our separate ways to study and go about the rest of our day. I'm feeling really great at this point. Came out of nowhere but I girl that I really enjoyed spending time with was now going to be going on a date with me, at her initiative!! I even saw some of my friends that had first identified her a year ago and was with me when I introduced myself to her while throwing baseball. It was a pretty great hour and a half.

She texts me and asks me where I am. Told her I was at the cafe on campus. She asks if I can meet her by the book store. I say of course, and I'm there in a few minutes, and a few minutes later she is saying that she is going to cancel the date because she doesn't think it is going to work between us.

To say I was surprised would be an understatement. Thankfully, as I said, I'm a bit older and a bit wiser and kept control of my face and emotions. I wanted to say many things about how dumb that was, that she was the one that basically asked me out, how she should have thought about this before bringing it up, and a great deal of many things, but I didn't. I said, "Ok, no worries."

I've learned that when people can change their minds so quickly on something, It's probably a good thing to get some distance from that person if you can. Emotional stability is a valuable commodity, and such a quick change on something like that shows, in my estimation a certain lack of maturity. There may be some that criticize me for being too harsh, saying it was just a date, and she wasn't actually committed to anything. But I would remind you, that she was the one that initiated, she was the one that wanted to be asked on a date, and when a date was set it took her only an hour and a half to change her mind on something that she probably had been thinking about for a while.

When someone leads you on and cuts the chord in such a short amount of time, just let it go and walk away. This former friend did my dirty. It was cold blooded, but I learned from it and I'm better for it now.

Dating Rule #1: Girls are fickle. 

Dating Chronicles: Gelato Girl 🍨

So here I am, single as a dollar bill, and one of my female friends suggests that I should go on a date with her friend.  So I say what any guy or girl would say when a friend is trying to set you up with a friend, "Can I see a picture of her?"

Of course I can ask that!  As much as character, personality, and chemistry is important - you have to be physically attracted to someone!  So this girl is pretty, pretty. That's when my friend drops the knowledge that she is a model my first thought is, "I've always wanted to go out with a model."

After some back and forth from my friend and her friend, I get her phone number, we start texting and I ask if she would like to get together to meet and get to know each other better. She says yes! Through talking with her and our mutual friend we decide to go to downtown Knoxville on Friday and get some gelato at this place called Coolato Gelato.

The day of our date arrives and I am super excited. This girl is pretty and from our limited conversation she seems super cool and we have a lot of shared interests. Anyway, I do the typical pre-date text sometime early in the day to confirm that we are still on for that evening and that I am looking forward to it. Several hours go by and I don't hear anything. Not unusual, but I would be lying if I wasn't a little concerned. When she does text me back she breaks the bad news to me that she is super sick, throwing up, and is going to have to cancel tonight.

I'm disappointed, but at the same time, I'm a nice guy and I am understanding of being sick and not able to go on a date. Throwing up is the worst. It's like an alien is rolling around in your stomach and finally crawls up out of you in a disgusting, smelly projectile! There is no way I would not be up for a date while feeling like that. So I respond the way any nice guy would, I say that I am sorry that she is feeling bad and ask if there is anything that I can get for her or do for her to help her recover and feel better. She says no, but thanks me for the offer.

My brother gets a hold of me that afternoon and asks me if I have any plans. It is after all, Friday night. I let him know that I had a date, but it got cancelled to her being sick and that I would be up for whatever. We decide to go to downtown Knoxville that evening anyway to hangout and grab some food.

That evening, my brother and I are walking down Gay Street in downtown Knoxville. It is a beautiful  night. The weather is perfect and downtown is bustling with all kinds of people. In the distance we see a group of girls walking towards us. Who is leading that group of girls laughing and talking all done up for a fun Friday night out? That's right. The girl I was supposed to get gelato with that night and was supposedly at home throwing up and too sick to go on a date.

I quickly tell my brother that she is the girl who cancelled the date because "she was sick." He asks if we are going to say anything, and I quickly tell him, "I got this."

I walk up to her with a big smile on my face. I was smiling so big that I looked like 1) I had just won the lottery or 2) I was about the embarrass this girl that had lied to me, cancelled a date with me, and couldn't have enough decency to be honest about it. It was the latter. 😁

This is how it went down: "Heyyy! I'm SO glad you're feeling better! You look great for having been throwing up earlier today! I'm happy that you were feeling good enough to come out and hang out with your friends. I hope you have a great rest of the night." And with that my brother and I keep on walking and smiling. She had the look of absolute horror and dread when she saw me. She faked a smile when I was talking to her, but her friends looked super confused.

Needless to say it had the desired effect. She sent me a text criticizing me for embarrassing her in front of her friends and that she can't believe I did that and communicated general sentiments of upset-ness towards me. My brother and I laughed and laughed. I didn't text her back, and we went on to have a great night.

Dating Rule #4: If you're going to end it, be honest and own it.