To begin my tell-all boy failure narrative, I’ll go way back to second year university. There was this guy at the gym. I’ve always called him Sandwich Man. I feel like Sandwich Man is representative of all that is both wrong and right with my approach to guys. I was bold, but not in person, through writing and emailing. Publicly, vulnerably bold. I told him my feelings, but a year later and to the entire school. I asked him out, but with a hijacked email address. I’m not even embarrassed about this anymore. I’m just putting it down to experience. This is what happened: After a workout I went to the gym cafeteria and ordered a calzone (I was young and naive. Since, i’ve learnt that 30 minutes of cardio doesn’t make a dent in even half a calzone. Oh to be optimistic!). He was working at the Caf and I made the mistake of thinking that he’d offered me a free salad. I also made the mistake of thinking he was checking me out as I dipped into my free salad and smiled and nodded his way. So I built myself up. It was second year and it had been as boy-barren as first year. I was determined to change its course. I walked up to where he was organizing some sandwiches and blurted out, “Thanks for the Salad.” So smooth, I know. “No Problem.” He responded, looking quizzically taken aback, of course because of my astounding post-gym beauty. I sauntered out of there suitably impressed with myself. This was it. I was going to have a boyfriend. No doubt! Except that Sandwich Man was never at the gym again, and I thought that he was the White Buffalo White Buffalo White Buffalo who galloped off. This was until a few months later when I was ordering another calzone. The caf lady asked me, “What salad do you want with that?” Always minding the waisline I responded, “No salad, thanks.” The caf lady sighed, “Honey, it’s included.” And just like that I watched a slow-motion capture of me approaching Sandwich Man smiling ridiculously like ‘I know you want me’ when all he wanted was to finish his shift. Typically, I began to see him around campus after this, and I had to diligently avoid him. That is, until we ended up at the same party one night and he seemed to have no idea that we’d met before. We danced and talked and it was great. “My Second Chance!” I thought. By this time, through mutual facebook friends and general stalking of campus publications i’d found out his name, what sports team he was on and that he wrote for the comedy paper. Naturally, I thought that it’d be cute to write up the Gym Caf story and send it to the paper. He’d recognize me, realize I wasn’t psycho and actually pretty cute and smart and he’d contact me. Also, he’d just written a comedy piece about how sexually frustrated he was, so it was perfect. The version of the Sandwich Man story I sent in wasn’t the greatest and I never even got confirmation from the paper that they’d received the story. Premature Rejection. This is my tragic flaw. Once i’ve gotten over deep soul crushing embarrassment that almost bars me from going to class, I get optimistic and try AGAIN! Later that year I saw Sandwich Man at a bar and he greeted me really enthusiastically, as if I had never stalked him. We talked for a while, he rejected my invitation to hit up the dance floor (which is where I excel- especially love it because I don’t have to keep up a conversation) and asked if I wanted to leave. YES!! We stepped onto the street and as he was unlocking his bike a brawl broke out across the street in which bottles were smashed and used as weapons. Pretty exciting, but it really took the wind out of my sails. “It was great to see you” I venture. “Yeah.” “We should do it again, you’re here all summer?” “Yeah that’d be cool.” and he rode off in the opposite direction. Did i sense the second (or was it third?) rejection. Of course not. What was my next step? I emailed him of course! With an address he had not given me. Our school has a default firstname.lastname @school.com email address for all students. So I used that. I invited him to go biking around the city if he ever felt like it and repeated how nice it was to see him. No reply. I’m pretty sure i’m a running joke between him and his friends. Lessons Learned:
Let Dead Stuff Die, Annik.
