Closing the File

I'll never forget the sentence a friend of mine uttered to me in high school when he wanted to tell me (gently) to stop pursuing a cute blue-eyed blond soccer player named Erica.

"Snark, It's time to close the Erica file."

(This was after she read the love note I'd written her, looked me up in the yearbook-- because she didn't know who I was-- and then laughed at my picture.)

*****

Over the years I've closed dozens of files on women I've pursued. I know how this works.

And it's time to close the file on Co-Op Girl.

She wasn't at the store yesterday when I did my weekly shopping, and since it's been a week since our last awkward conversation, where she said she'd email me but has been really busy, it's time for me to accept the only possible conclusion. She's just not into me.

Oh, I could continue to rationalize and do mental gymnastics to figure out how it's possible she's still interested but really has been busy. But it's been four weeks. There's a principle in science that says the simplest explanation is the most likely. She's not interested.

I still don't know what happened that last time we talked. Why she bothered to approach me at all, just to tell me that she would email me, and then didn't. Maybe I just seemed too aloof and she figured I'd lost interest. Maybe she expected me to ask her out in person and was giving me that opportunity and I blew it. Whatever. She's a decent human being and wanted to acknowledge the card and chocolate I gave her, but otherwise doesn't know how to reject me. It's fine. I don't want to make anyone uncomfortable.

I actually had planned to push the issue one last time when I went shopping yesterday. Only she wasn't there. Whenever I'm prepared so act, she's not there. Whenever I'm unprepared, she is.

As I drove away from the Co-Op yesterday, I decided it's time. Time to do the online dating thing. Since I also closed the file on Mystery Girl last month, for the moment my "organic" dating possibilities are no more.

*****

If I can ever find the time to put up a profile, I'll start online dating.

I've been super busy the past week, and this week will be the same. I had a busy social weekend. It seems that all my friends who I hadn't seen much the past six months wanted to see me last week. Then I hosted an impromptu NFL playoffs party at my house Sunday afternoon. Those were the good times.

But between all of that I had some down moments and crappy moods. I found myself with a few unexpected hours of downtime Saturday and tried to work on my book, but I was uninspired. At times I felt that special kind of loneliness you get when you miss sex with your ex. Hornliness?

This week I'm overwhelmed with work. I'm hitting the "busy season", spending 12-hour days doing the thing I like least about my job.

*****

So I don't know when I'll have time to craft my online dating profile. I'm afraid to start online dating, anyway, because just like real life, there will be much rejection. I'll have to respond to five profiles to get one response, and that won't go anywhere.

And most of the profiles will be boring, anyway. I thought they were boring before I met K, and she just raised the bar even higher. It's hard for me to imagine how I'm going to describe what I'm looking for. Do I just list all the qualities that made K so great?

I doubt I'll ever meet someone like her on a dating site.