Dating. The Absurd Circus.

I'm sort of considering entering the shark infested waters again. I don't know why.

For a woman who seems to be surrounded by violent death and bizarre disasters, I engage in a great deal of oddly optimistic behavior.

I'm not ACTUALLY dating again yet. I'm just thinking about it. It seems like the moment I become single, men just surface in my life in order to muck about with my head and make certain that I'm incapable of having a reasonable pleasant day without a bit of emotional turmoil. Especially since I'm still in that part of recovery from my last relationship where I get all weepy whenever he shows up and have to act like I need to pee so I can go check my mascara. And he didn't even leave me. Imagine what I'm like when I get dumped! It's apocalyptic. Really. Fireworks. Tickets could be sold to the circus that is my emotional hysteria.

So WHY would I consider dating? Ever again?

All evidence points toward the absurdity of this activity. I mean, the way men TALK when they are first trying to ask you on a date - that alone makes it a complete mystery that our species continues to propagate.

I have had men ask me what my sign is. Pretend they know me from somewhere. "Compliment" me by telling me that I move in such a sensual way (what IS that?). Tell me that they only date redheads - as if I should feel special that I qualify for their special club. Tell me their net worth - Actually describe what their assets are. Tell me that I seem interested in THEM and that, based on my good taste, they should give me a chance (Yes. I'm serious).

I'm fortunate in that most of my actual dating experience has been less fraught with crazypants. I've only gone on a couple of weird first-and-only dates. The hot biker/professional stripper who could only talk about himself and his furniture refinishing projects. The business executive who had his entire life planned down to the moment. The surfer type (complete with bright Hawaiian shirt) who confessed about his alcoholism right away and then talked for the next two hours about his recovery group. The miracle, really, is that I ever get to the first date stage at all when so much random bizarro stuff gets thrown my way in the "hitting on" phaze. Men do and say strange things. Not ALL men. But the ones who DO bring the crazy and inappropriate to the table seem to bring SOOOO much of it that they cover other men in a haze of associated wackadoo.

The best freaky first date story I know isn't my own, though. It's that of a close friend. She met a guy from teh interwebs. I'm not saying online dating doesn't work. I know very happy couples who have met that way... but sometimes it can mean missing out on the opportunity to filter someone's lunacy quotient sufficiently. Now, I can't remember why, but my friend let this guy come to her house after they had dinner. I guess he had seemed normal up to that point. When they got back to her house and were walking up to her front door, he actually stopped, unzipped his pants and started to urinate on the tree in her front yard! She told him, "Hey! I have a bathroom inside..." and he says, "Oh, don't worry. This is fine."

I guess he liked her a LOT. Couldn't even walk to her door the first time without marking his territory.

Needless to say, they never went out again... But THAT is what waits out there, people. Men who will ask for your astrological sign and whiz on your tree!

I'm glad we had this talk.

On second thought... I'm staying out of the water a while longer. There are some lunatic shark in there.