Too often in our lives we have chickened out, fibbed, told a white lie, etc. all to avoid telling the truth especially when it comes to romantic encounters. Sometimes friends fix us up with a blind date or mother arranges for the daughter or son of a dear friend to just happen to bump into us. Of course there are cases when all goes swimmingly and everyone is delighted. But what to do when there are ghastly vibrations on both sides? Worse, not on both sides; only yours! Too often gay and lesbians have faced that dreadful situation with people who are perfectly nice, but straight.
A lesbian friend from a very high-class family in Tokyo got out of an arranged marriage situation with wonderful savor faire. At the formal “first tea” with the man, his parents, her parents and the matchmaker in a gorgeous hotel restaurant, she picked up her tea cup first. End of problem. Of course nothing was said, but the meeting ended very quickly and after endless smiles and bows they departed. Everyone knew the match was off. He couldn’t possibly marry a woman with such appalling bad manners. Old customs do have their uses.
Today disastrous first meetings can arise anywhere through the many matchmaking sites on the Internet. Hours are spent browsing (can we say cruising here?) for the perfect match. When all looks promising, a coffee shop date is arranged. You arrive early to check out the incredible guy or gal (who has arrived even earlier to check you out). The Internet lover is thrilled on seeing you, of course, and bounds over to your table. A gay guy might look up and find a leering, drooling Quasimodo whose manner clearly suggests forgetting the coffee and racing off to his lair to engage in unprintable acts. Lesbians can have the same scenario and both have the same options:
1. Do not beat around the bush: tell them they are not what you expected and flee.
2. Beat around the bush: be polite, sit and chat for ten minutes, develop a headache (how clever) and leave after promising to call.
I suggest the latter for two reasons. First, the main point here is to remember rejection (and truth) hurts; therefore, beating around the bush is not always a bad thing. Even if they only pretend to believe you, feelings are soothed and everyone feels better. Second and maybe more important, the ten-minute delay sometimes has unexpected results. Once you start talking, a real conversation may develop, the time limit vanish and the importance of the person’s appearance fade. One might even succumb to a brief dalliance d’amour, especially if the hour is past 2 a.m.
What I’m getting at is that by giving that little extra time to get to know the person, you might find a charming, intelligent, warmhearted person behind the less than movie star appearance. Give it a chance … and by the way, maybe he/she is giving you that second chance.
