My Worst Date

It was all so innocent, starting out with a mutual right swipe. He had curly hair, which I always love, so I decided to send him a message. The dude seemed nice, and even a little artsy with his picture in front of an old train. He responded after a few hours, and then conversation flowed, things were going OK. We talked for two weeks over text before deciding to meet up. Then the day came, and he suggested we meet at his favorite donut shop, which would have been fine, casual and close to home in case I needed to run. However, his way of starting the date was to tell me how he used to spend a lot of money on his dates, until he started getting less and less second dates so he started spending less and less money on them; the donuts were five dollars all together. Then our conversation (really his because he did most of the talking) started to get grouchy. He went on and on about how he's angry with his NYU advisor, so I started composing a "help me" text to my roommate, who unfortunately didn't have cell service. I didn't know how long I could deal with this; he sounded nothing like he did virtually. How could I not have known? Had he calculated everything he sent before he sent it?

While I awaited my roommate's response, we decided to go for a walk. Unbeknownst to me, this would be a walk along the entire High Line which, if you don't know, is kinda long. Now, my date didn't know this because I never brought it up, but I was recovering from leg surgery, so misery ensued. In hindsight, it probably would've been a good excuse to go home, but I was trying to be open-minded. On top of the leg pain, the grouchy conversation continued. He told me about how he's going into real estate for the money, he hates "buzz words," how he thinks we should treat homeless people better, but one time a homeless man asked him for food and he said "no," etc., and the pain in my head started to distract from my leg. I kept looking over at the water as I nodded and said "uh huh" and "wow" every now and again. Finally, he thought it was OK to ask me if I'd never been on a date before because I'm Jewish, and when I said I didn't understand the correlation, he said he occasionally makes Jewish jokes because he watches a lot of Seinfeld. He hadn't asked about me or anything in my life the whole time we'd been on this disaster date, and this was how he chose to do it. That was the last straw; with or without my roommate, this date needed to be over. I came up with an excuse about having "a lot of homework to do" and "an early morning tomorrow," and we made our way back to my dorm. On the way over, I gazed back at the donut shop and wished I had left from there. Eventually, we reached my building, we said our goodbyes at the door (he probably expected more than a hug from me), and I'm sure on his next date with some unaware girl, he spent less than five dollars.

Let this be a warning to everyone on dating apps: just because someone's nice over text, doesn't mean they are in person. Also, if they aren't nice in person, you have something to write about in the future.

This was #MyWorstDate.