ANGER

You know when you have felt worried and upset for days, and it turns suddenly into pure unadulterated RAGE. I had a student yesterday have an outburst similar to that, slamming desks, chairs, throwing himself against doors and banging his head into closets. It was a scary thing to watch. Someone so angry that even bodily harm alleviates that rage. It's an even worse thing to FEEL. I have no feelings for T right now except for that pure unadulterated rage. ANGER. Disgust. And what brought all this on, one might ask... after days of hoping to hear from him? Not necessarily hoping something had happened to him, but hoping he'd resurface and have the best f'n excuse I've ever heard for why he hadn't been in contact. Besides just being a pussy (and I will note that I hate this word, but I can't think of a better description).

So, I've been worried about his well being, concerned about him for days and days... hashed and rehashed this out with friends, family, colleagues, anyone who was willing to listen let alone give me their 2 cents basically. I had my roommate doing investigative work for me, just so I could know the god damned boy was still breathing. Well, aren't I the fool? He's alive and well enough I might gather. Yup. And how do I know, one could ask me? Well, as many a blog before I have posted, I have "mad" librarian skills... and with those intense searching skills comes an ability to find information about people they might not even know exist. This was not the case with T, try as I might, finding information if he were dead or alive proved to be a futile attempt. I tried search engines, social networking sites, etc. Nothing except an old Friendster profile from god knows how long ago. Alas I had nothing to do with this worried feeling I had; I tried texting him, the same no response, and tonight, I called just for one last attempt to see if he was alive. He didn't answer, no surprise. And on the message I just asked, nicely, I thought, if he could just send me an email, didn't have to be anything detailed or in depth, just something so I could know he was alive. An empty email for all I care. Did he? Not a chance.

So as I was working on my homework tonight, a discussion in my graduate school thread about finding "hard to find" biographical information (oooh us crazy librarians!) came up, and someone mentioned that after searching through obscure sites and really wracking her brain for ways to find it, she had realized she had overlooked some of the most basic sites because she automatically assumed they would be no use for her. This struck a chord with me. Hmmm. Of course! Once an online dater, always an online dater is what I've found, and most of the guys that I've met on jdate, or the onion, or craigslist even, usually have a dating profile on at least one of the other sites. So I chose the most basic, well known online dating website and did a search for a 30 y/o man within 5 miles from me. Voila! There he was, and active within 5 days. Now it's been 9 days since I first called him to wish him a good first day of work, 6 days since I emailed him... so did he get my email? Most likely. Did he get my phone calls/text messages, most likely as well. When I think about the time I spent, worrying about his well being, besides the intense anger, I have to laugh. Because seriously, this guy was SO not worth the effort. Did I like him, without a doubt. Would I have liked to have seen him more, most definitely. But if at 30 years old, you are incapable of sending someone an email, the most passive form of human interaction, just to MAN up to the fact that you are no longer interested, than seriously, you are not worth my time. T had every opportunity to back out graciously too, without all this drama. He just started a new job, and could have used the excuse that he was just too busy to date anyone right now. Ok, I would have been hurt and disappointed, but I wouldn't have been over here wondering and waiting.

What kind of person at 30 (almost 31 mind you!) doesn't know how to have a normal human interaction? I mean don't guys ever outgrow the childish avoidance behavior. I see it a lot in my 10 year old students, and it is mostly the boys. If I say something to a girl that they don't like, they yell back at me. If I say something to a boy that he doesn't like, he puts his hands over his head or turns his back and refuses to respond. I feel like this is T's way of putting his hands over his head, and being a coward. Yes, it's hard to reject someone, and I know well enough how hard it is to just say, please leave me alone (re: the subway stalker), but it's the right thing to do. If this had been one or two dates and he did this, I am sure I would have responded much differently. However, after 5 dates, where he was expressing just as much (if not more) interest in me, I believe I deserve at the very least a passive one line email.

I could go the route of belittling him, and listing every reason why he's not good enough for me, and exposing all of his vulnerabilities that he revealed in the short time we knew each other. It would make me feel better momentarily. But I'm not a woman scorned here, I didn't love him, he didn't do me some great injustice. He's just a little boy who hasn't grown up enough in his abilities to deal with women. I don't understand why guys don't think a mature woman can't handle a little honesty. I'm much better at dealing with rejection than dealing in the unknown.

I took a chance on this guy, and it didn't work out. There are plenty of other chances out there (good news for the blog), I'm a little angry that I cancelled dates with 3 other potentials to see where this one went, maybe I missed out on something great, who knows maybe I'll give one of them a call...

to be continued...