My mother told me when I moved to LA that I needed to be careful in every situation. I took that to heart in a lot of ways, but it’s really difficult to be one hundred percent safe when jumping into the abyss of online dating. I try mainly to keep my perimeter safe; crowded meeting location, not too dark, keep the first date relatively short, always always keep pepper spray on hand, and wear pants.
I would never profess myself an expert, if I was, I probably wouldn’t still be dating. I would however qualify myself as an experienced “first dater” because I have been on so many random, horrible, awesome, ridiculous first dates that most people wouldn’t believe me if I told them. I am just a typical girl though struggling to live in the big bad city of Los Angeles. Never would I say I’m the typical LA girl though, I’m far from it. My name is Grace Parker, I have reddish brown hair that falls down just below my shoulders, bright green eyes that change colors depending on the weather, fair skin and a good amount of freckles, longish legs though a slightly short torso and a decently sizable upper torso. Yes, all of this I somewhat highlight in my profile, paints a great picture doesn’t it? What I don’t say…I am not the skinniest girl ever though I wouldn’t call myself fat. I would put myself somewhere in the middle, curvy though confident with what I have. I don’t have a “decent backside” but I never stop doing squats because I am told again and again that that is how you “work that booty”…whatever that means. You see my point is; online profiles don’t tell you everything.
Like right now, I am sitting at the bar top because it’s way too cold to stand outside. I don’t care what people from the Mid-West say to me, I know I am in Los Angeles, but I am from Southern California. Sixty degrees with a slight wind chill wearing skinny jeans and a flimsy top is considered cold to me.
Shaking my head in annoyance that I left my overly heavy peacoat in my car I try to shake off the chills of the slightly full bar. There aren’t a whole lot of people, but the bar itself is dark and crowded in the small space allotted. Not my usual digs either, though I would never turn down a dive bar I typically go for places that have more than three beers on the tap list, especially if those beers end in “Lite”. A sharp throat clearing from behind me grates into my ear and I turn my head to find my date.
First impression, oh dear god what did I get into. Second impression, I swear he didn’t look that short on the profile.
“Hi,” I squeaked out. Yes, I squeak, and surprisingly it pulled a smile from mister short stuff.
“Hey there, you look beautiful tonight.” His eyes did the whole dart down my body and slowly slide back up thing forgetting to look me in the eyes again for several long seconds. He wasn’t bad looking at all, in fact he had a really cute way about his style. I would put it somewhere between punk, surfer, and college frat boy. “Can I get you a drink?” He asked after his eyes found their way back to my face.
“Sure, I’ll have an Old Fashioned.” Though I might need two to get through this one. His eyes were already doing that wide open saucer gaze meaning that in about five minutes I would have to figure out a way to distance myself from his groping hands. Actually it took less than three minutes.
After one old fashioned and a complimentary shot of Jameson by my over eager date and I was ready to leave. Not leave with him leave, just leave, run away and never see this guy again. In the span of 20 minutes (I still can’t believe I lasted that long!) he asked me to join him back at his place for a threesome, because coming back to be with him, a virtual stranger, wasn’t already extremely strange. He wondered where I was from because I was so exotically beautiful, which makes him (as my grandmother would put it) fecally impacted with bovine manure. I am from Southern California, I am Scottish/Irish/English/with a dash of Native American. I am not exotic, I am a white girl with freckles which I feel like is highly common in the wild outback of…Los Angeles. Exotic my arse! He told me that he would love love love to have a girlfriend as beautiful as me which he followed up with flickered of eye contact toward my shirt and a biting/licking of his lower lips. Gross.
“You are the most beautiful thing,” he said with a slight slur. The alcohol was definitely getting to him.
“I am not a thing, I am a person you know.” I replied snippily. I couldn’t help it. It was the hundredth time I pushed his hand off my upper thigh only to have him slip his hand down my lower back. I no longer cared about being nice, or being a sweet first date, I was getting angry. I was all for a little mild flirting, but I have boundaries, and mister hands on tactic had crossed over the line. “I really actually need to be going.”
“No, you can’t, you haven’t been here nearly long enough!”
“Funny, I feel like I have massively overstayed my welcome.”
He didn’t find that funny at all, the pursed lips and scrunched eyebrows that made him resemble a frustrated child showed proof of that. “You haven’t finished your drink, and if you leave before you do, you can pay for yours yourself.”
I sneered at him, and honestly if I was a dragon he would have been burnt toast after that comment. “You ordered these drinks, and your card is up at the register. Remove your hands from me, I am leaving.” I stood without caring what he said, or even what he did. I was in a bar full of people, there wasn’t much he could do to harm me, but just in case I pulled my pepper spray from my purse and held it tightly in my hand.
I started toward the door but didn’t get all that far before a hand yanked on my elbow from behind and I quickly found a sharp corner of the wall at my back, and a short yet surprisingly muscular body at my front. “Leaving without finishing your drink is rude sweetheart, leaving me without a kiss goodnight is just down right mean.” At this point, the panic started to taste like bile in my throat. This man child was beyond ridiculous, he was actually leaning in toward me for a kiss.
“You must be joking,” I replied, though failed to keep the blatant shock from my voice. He totally wasn’t kidding.
“Well if you aren’t going to kiss me,” he said as his hands pulled away from my body giving me a momentary moment of relief. That is until I saw where his hands were traveling. In the loud atmosphere of the bar I couldn’t actually hear it, but I knew that the zipper to his pants was being pulled down. I saw him reach into his overly tight man skinny jeans. “If you aren’t going to kiss me,” he reiterated as he pulled out his proportionately sized member to his smaller stature, “then you can at least touch him for me?”
I think I laughed, though maybe choked on air would be a better explanation of my reaction. Regardless, I smiled, looked him straight in the eyes and lifted up my cute little pink bottled pepper spray. “If you don’t move away from me, and put that little tuna can you have there away, I will happily spray your junk with my pepper spray.”
Shock, horror, and bewilderment crossed his overly tanned face before his hands flew up into the air leaving his pants splayed wide open and his little member flopping back and forth in equal amounts of surprised terror. “Whatever you say bitch, just don’t shoot me!”
Of course me standing up for myself makes me a bitch. Of course everything I did until that very moment was seen as an invitation. I didn’t care, because I hadn’t done anything to deserve what he was putting me through, and I wouldn’t take what he had to offer sitting down. I kept my finger on the trigger and backed away toward the door before I pushed I open and slipped out into the night. I felt exuberant and disgusted with the evening, horrified and amazed.
I walked back to my car (I would say a nice clipped power walk to be safe) with my keys in my hand, my pepper spray still gripped between my fingers and a smug smile on my face. No one would ever force me into anything I didn’t want to do, and if they did, I wouldn’t hesitate to spray their junk. Best line of the night…
I remember the first time I was broken up with, it was horrible! I cried endlessly. My eyes felt like they were going to pop out of my head from the pressure of my incessant wailing, but I didn't care. I was heartbroken to the millionth degree. Snot ran down my face in rivers of yuck but still I remained steadfast in my state of misery. I wanted to whole world to feel the ache in the cavity of my chest, I wanted everyone to see my anguish and my loss. I was 19 years old and I had lost the love of my life, up until that moment at least.
The point I am getting at is to not let them control you. Have a moment to panic and freak out because your life as you know it is about to change but you have to think of that positively. Life will change, but open up. You will have more time to focus on you and your wants and needs. You will have more focus on what you want plus more drive to achieve it. A breakup is painful and frustration because you feel like you failed, but in truth, they are a blessing in disguise.
