How Flowers And Dinner Ruin A First Date

Considering how hard it is to find someone to actually want to go out of our comfort zone with, we definitely need to establish some ground rules.

Do not surprise me with flowers. We do not know each other yet; what if I am allergic? Or if I am one of those people who believe the ripping from Mother Earth is the same as murder?

Furthermore, I do not know how am I supposed to react. Of course, being well-raised and all I will smile, thank you, and accept the bouquet (what else would anyone do, really?); but inside my head, there would be turmoil and confusion.

What year is it, did I travel back in time? 

Does this mean that you are really into me? Or are you desperate and would do it with anybody? 

Did you happen to have a bouquet lying around at home and you re-gifted it or are you courting me?

Will you be expecting something in exchange for your gallant gesture?

But, most important of all, where on earth will I keep them during our date? What if there won’t be enough space on the table? Should I place it on the floor, maybe under the chair, or am I expected to have them on my lap and smell them from time to time, like a prize Pulitzer winner?

You can see where I am coming from, your so-called romantic gesture has given me more problems than I had to sort during a whole week's work. And as I am concentrating on the flowers issue, I am not focusing on us. Are you glaring at me with doggy eyes because you just asked me something and are waiting for an answer or you just paid me a compliment?

I’ll go for a smile and just ask you: 

“I am sorry, did you say something?”

Why, oh God, why do you look so taken aback? I was busy sorting the damned flowers you just homage me with!

This is so embarrassing, maybe he’s expecting a disquisition about flowers and I am not even sure what flowers are these. I have heard that each type has a meaning. I just know that the red rose means “love” and these are not red roses, thank God. Maybe I should excuse myself, go to the washroom and make a little research on google so that I know what your intentions are and know how to react.

All this happens during the first minutes of our very first and most likely last date. 

We both know it will be a very long evening because for some mysterious reason we have both agreed to a dinner date. Once again, I ask myself, why?

You do not do dinner on the first date.

Everyone with a minimum of common sense knows it. What if you realize that you hate each other at the beginning of the evening? How do you escape it without being a total moron?

Most people pre-arrange a phone call from a friend who feigns some kind of emergency so that if the date is a disaster, you can make your excuses keeping intact the dignity for both parties. 

The main problem with the ingenious technique is that it’s worldwide known. If you walk away from me while I am in the middle of my pesto pasta after receiving the “phone call that your grandma is in hospital”, I will feel mortified because trust me, I KNOW what’s going on here.

There’s a fat chance that my evening is just as awful as yours, why should YOU be the one to put an end to it? Even if I rather am anywhere else as much as you do, I will NOT feel grateful to you for leaving me alone and have the other diners thinking that I am the bore YOU got stuck with and look at me with pity.

Imagine that. And add a bunch of flowers uncomfortably sitting on my lap.

Another worldwide known fact is that we have both tried to prepare for the average two hours dinner conversation with a few routine questions plus others on subjects that, according to our social, we might have in common. And that’s how we land on a monosyllabic and embarrassing semi-conversation of sex toys.

I know for sure he’s been scrolling my Facebook page as recently my friend Daniela has jokingly tagged me in a link about dildoz. If he had done his research well and actually read the article, he would have found out it wasn’t promoting its use, but giving the shop assistants point of view about their daily customers, the most common questions they had to deal with, and so on. 

Kind of funny, really, but I was not one of them and my date had, not only totally misunderstood, giving away the fact that he’d been scrolling VERY little and hadn’t even bothered to elaborate on what was it about, but also revealing something you shouldn’t reveal on a first date. He was totally into sex toys and deeply hurt by my lack of interest.

I blame the dinner; specifically, the supposedly romantic French restaurant that offers phallic-shaped bread on the table. That’s the only way to explain it. Who on their right mind would have come up with that sort of subject if not unconsciously suggested by the food and maybe by yours truly carefreely placing it into her mouth?

How can I ever be comfortable again eating in front of a date? I will be obsessed with the shape of the food FOREVER. Forget sushi rolls, ice-cream cones, drinks with a straw, and carbohydrate-based cuisines until at LEAST the fourth or fifth date.

Meals with strangers can turn out to be real torture when you both run out of things to say but you feel obliged to fill up awkward silences with silly and sometimes nonsensical comments.

“So. How come still single?”

Wait. What? What are you implying? That there’s a problem with me? And what about you? Why are YOU still single?

But you can’t say that, it would be rude. So, after a few stunned seconds, I just chuckle nervously and try to look cheeky. 

“I guess the right person hasn’t come along yet”

“Why nowadays women are so picky?” he frowns.

He. Frowns. Excuse me?? After all my efforts of pretending to be flattered by the flowers and his insensitive questions, I have to sit here and let you call ME picky? 

I excuse myself, go to the washroom and arrange a fake phone call from my friend Daniela. I will also pretend to forget the damned flowers under the chair.