A Quick Update While Date #7 is in the Shower…
Date #7 is in the shower, which means I have a few moments to myself for the first time since… well, since I arrived in Pittsburgh on Saturday afternoon. Not that I’m complaining– far from– but to be honest, the thought of writing anything right now– let alone anything coherent about my weekend with the Man from Across the State– seems akin to climbing Everest at this point. (Hence the fact that I’ve just used two em-dashes in one sentence and didn’t even bother to format them properly).
Nonetheless, I had a feeling this would happen, so I prepared a little something for today in advance. I do promise to get back to writing my own blog sooner or later…
Until then, enjoy the following:
Today’s post comes courtesy of my dear friend and former suitemate, Aliza. When I decided to start featuring guest posts, I asked Aliza to pen the first because she’s one of the few people who can crack me up as much almost as much as I crack myself up (and I find myself pretty damn amusing, so that’s quite a feat). Also, her dating career has been… rather… interesting shall we say? So read on, especially if you’re contemplating an office romance.
From the Desk of Aliza
I met Kat on the first day of college. We were suitemates in the Healthy Living House with two other girls. Yup, Healthy Living. We were probably the only group of kids who actually followed the rules and didn’t drink or drug out while living in that dorm. (Unless, Kat, you know something I don’t?) Well anyway, I learned a lot those first two years of living with your favorite blogger. Much of it was about boys.
You see, before college, I had never been in a relationship and never really figured out how to talk to the males. On the first night of college I inadvertently flirted so much with one of our fellow house mates that we cleared the room. Apparently I was putting out the “I need some action so y’all better skedaddle” vibe.
Totally unintended.
(Please do keep in mind that this was the healthy living house and we weren’t drinking.)
When he asked if I wanted to go on a walk, I agreed. Why not? It was a nice evening. What could be wrong with exploring campus on our first day? Silly me. I realized halfway through our stroll that my new “friend” was frantically looking for a place to sit. We found the nearest park bench and he sat so close that I finally got the message. I went totally rigid. When he put his arm around me, I looked straight ahead and said the first thing I could think of to stop what was about to happen: Can we head back? I need to get to bed…I have a headache.
Geez, I was a rock star.
I made him so uncomfortable that he came by our room two days later and apologized for supposing what he was supposing.
Over the next few weeks, Kat and I came to know each other better. And we shared some good life tips. For example, if you have curly hair like we do, you need to embrace the curl! Don’t brush it out or put it to one of those awful straightening irons. No. Embrace your curls because you know they’re stupendous.
Of equal importance, when Sex and the City is on, it’s always time for chocolate fondue.
But perhaps most relevant to this blog spot, I learned from Kat that guys have guy friends. I still tell myself this when I have a deadbeat date. Unfortunately, it’s not always strong enough to get me through the evening.
During the remainder of my four years at college, I had my series of crushes. Some of them I referred to as my “5-minute crushes” where the emotion lasted only as long as we could sit in the dining hall…which was an incredibly long time, but you get the picture.
Now, as a single woman also living with her parents (and brother) in a suburb of Baltimore and currently working at that very same college that so stymied my dating career as an undergraduate, my love life is well…the same.
Why did I choose to work at the one place where I met my bridesmaids but not my groom? I wish I knew. There are less than five eligible bachelors working at our alma mater. No seriously, there are less than five. The rest are married, taken, or gay.
This would explain which I eventually made the decision to try my luck with JDate, eHarmony and Match.com, but I’ll save those stories for another time…
Until then, I know office romances are a bad idea but still: it would be nice to have the option! So, to all the single ladies out there (and the gents, if you work in a male-dominated industry), does your career help or hinder your love life?
Kat Echevarría Richter 
9 Responses to “A Quick Update While Date #7 is in the Shower…”
Great post Aliza! I worked in a an all female industry, or at the very least guys were usually gay, being a florist is about as male dominated as the dance studio, nursery school, you get the point…So, I never had this opportunity either–thankfully I was already dating the chauffeur so it wasn’t so problematic. AND almost all of my classes in college were also dominated by females, which is why I joined a sorority…to meet guys and go to parties, even though I was “just looking”. 😉
I mostly work with women in my publishing unit, but I work in a pretty big office, so if I was single, I’d probably be able to meet _somebody_! Years ago, I dated a guy from work. We met one summer while we were doing temp work in a law office. We kept dating for a few months afterward because it turned out that our apartments were in the same neighborhood. It was sort of fun for a while, but looking back, it probably should have stayed a summer fling.
My job should help my dating life since I work in the very male dominated engineering industry. But after dating 2 co-workers (one I was lucky enough to end amicably. The other was a small disaster, but he ended up fired a few months later…), I am pretty strick about not mixing business and pleasure.
By the way, the relationship that ended well was a VERY close call. It’s one thing to date a cowoker, it is quite another to date on of the IT guys. The ability to read your email is just the tip of the iceberg. Beware.
For nearly eight years I’ve worked in a male-dominated engineering culture, and the few ladies worth speaking to are generally taken or otherwise uninterested (in me). However, as it turns out, my job managed to put me in place to meet Ms. D.
Through work I volunteer to teach fifth graders science projects, and Ms. D is a firth grade science teacher at one of those schools. Near the end of the school year last year, I asked her out.
The rest, as they say, is history (or at least history in the making!).
I met my husband at work, same work where I met Kat. I can’t count the number of people I know who met their spouse/significant other at that place. Nor can I count the number of people/couples who dated/hooked up there. In fact, it’s sort of dangerous to participate in one of those 6 degrees of separation type conversations about present and former employees. Ick. However good it was for my love life (married almost 19 years, looks like it’ll stick) I wouldn’t advise it as a career move.
Where’s Kat, dammit! How am I supposed to get through this day?
Anyway, cute story. Love is as twisted and lovely as Bonsai.
I work inside of the Spa/Salon industry, and before that was a dog groomer, so both of those professions have nothing but women in there. We have one guy who does hair (straight) and all he does all day long is slide behind the girls he works with and massages their shoulders, etc. He’s never tried that on me because I think he knows better, but I swear he just has flirting in his genetics.
I got a text message from a good buddy with a date in shower once. It read as funny as your post.
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