Hold on, aren't I a bit too young to play Mrs. Robinson?

I had a weird encounter yesterday.  Went down to the Starbucks at Astor Place to get some tea and have a session of journal writing.  That was going well and I was relatively far along into it, measuring out discrete letters with that V-ball pen of mine, when a guy stumbled trying to tie his shoelaces for so long right in my line of sight that eventually I had to acknowledge him and smile.

Uh-oh.  Setup!  First time I think I've been approached by an actual con artist.  I'll explain.

Boyfriend looked at me with a slightly goofy, dazed smile and then paused for dramatic effect just so he could say "Wow, you have really pretty eyes!"

I said thanks.  Hey, a compliment's a compliment.  We looked at each other for a minute, me in full Saturday geekgirl mode in my jeans, sneakers and "There's no place like 127.0.0.1" shirt and him with mussed, dyed blond hair, a yellow-green striped shirt with some jade pendant draped over it.  He looked like a young version of Kurt Cobain minus the heroin.  And he was a singer too, of course.

His name was Sammy.  He introduced himself then excused himself to go to the bathroom because, you know, when you gotta go you gotta go.  And could I hold on for a few minutes?

I went back to writing in my journal.  More jottings about the week, about my recent decision on what to do for the next year vis-a-vis work versus grad school.  Sammy did come back a little while later and asked if he could sit down.  I figured why not, this could be interesting.  I may be a bit buttoned up in practice but attitude-wise there's more of the libertine in me than usually sees the light of day and I could relate to a bit of the itinerant wanderer.  And I'll confess, there was a little spark in that moment that we'd seen each other.  Whatever comes next can go this way or that way but a spark is a spark.  Anyhow, when he started talking it confirmed what I was guessing might be the case -- he was a real wild child looking for an anchor, pretty lost and flailing about.  Searching for housing in NYC and had popped a Vicodin just to deal with the day. 

Very conscious of his assets and physical appeal, too, not one bit ashamed to play the role of the male gigolo and cater to what he thought it was that I wanted.  I won't lie, something about him was attractive all right and it didn't hurt that he had a sexy Arkansan drawl, but it both surprised me and didn't surprise me to hear that (A) he always lived with his girlfriends (B) he had some kind of girlfriend in an open relationship waiting for him in Thailand (C) he dated older woman (at 24 himself, he was very excited and oh-so-shocked when he found out I'm 31) and (D) did I have a man? 

This would be the first time anyone's ever hinted at the desire to have me be their sugar mommy.   I laughed and smiled, first lying and saying that I have a boyfriend (didn't even want to get into it with this guy) and then saying truthfully that I prefer to live alone because I'm the independent sort and enjoy having my own space.  He then made some silly comment about how that's all well and good but if you're not living in the same house as your man then he probably likes his independence too and is bringing girls over to his place while you're not around.  I found that logic faulty -- if someone really wants to cheat they're going to find a way, cohabitation or no.  If you're going to have a relationship at some point you have to make that leap of faith and trust him or her, there's no way around it. 

But my double-talking would-be couch-crashing mooching boyfriend definitely didn't operate on those terms.  Working with a short attention span, before long he started chatting up the girl sitting one table over.  An NYU masters student with pretty, big blue eyes, she was definitely freaked out even with my presence.  She left pretty quickly.  Sammy turned to me and murmured something about stuck-up NYU students but I pointed out to him that some women don't feel comfortable being approached in that way.  In one ear and out the other.

We talked for a while longer but then it became clear that he was going to dig in and see if he couldn't get something out of me.  I also noted how much journal writing was not getting done and that had kinda been my main point of going out that afternoon.  So I said it was time for me to head out and we shook hands, locking eyes briefly one more time.  "Damn, I wish you were single," he said.  "I bet you do," I thought.  Never met anybody quite on the make before as that guy was.  Makes me appreciate the genuine guys I know all the more.

Comments

[elady]

Ya reckon?

Can't help it - it somehow works for me in this case (not always). Go figure. Got family from Texas so it sounds a little bit like home.

Now as for ThinkGeek, yes... all your cash are belong to them. A sizeable part of my wardrobe came from them and our sysadmin just bought some cubicle goodies from there to decorate our new space. Oh yes, ThinkGeek is good.

[jon deal]

I don't believe a WORD of this.

"sexy, Arkansan drawl"

THERE IS NO SUCH THING! :-]

And now I have to go out and buy that 127.0.0.1 tee-shirt from ThinkGeek. I could drop some serious change there.