Parental Guidance

I love my mother. She is an amazing, wonderful, eternally optimistic woman. But, like many mothers who are desperately seeking a son-in-law, her matchmaking skills suck. Tonight I got a call from a guy who was given my number by my mother. I was told that he was divorced, too! This news was delivered with as much excitement and promise as if we had both visited the same African village in an effort to find ourselves.

"And," my mother gushed with just enough pause (for anyone who didn't know better) to think she was going to say he won the Pulitzer or, even better, was a George Clooney look alike. "He went to school here." Now by "here" my mother means in the United States but "school" could mean college or grad school but never high school. To think that my family had uncovered an American-raised prospect for me would be giving them credit for understanding what a "cultural disconnect" is. As far as they're concerned, I'm a big snob with an ego that could fill a football stadium.

When a 5'4" cardiologist showed up at my house wearing white jeans and my sister couldn't even deliver the description as I put on my Eastern garb for the big reveal without crying because she was laughing so hard, my dad told me I was too picky. "Any man who marries you will commit suicide," he deadpanned. Pun intended. But he wasn't joking and for years, I kept thinking I would be another Joan Rivers, coming home to find that my hubby had kicked the chair out from under him. That was then, this is now. Now, my parents not so subtly suggest that I'm not getting any younger and "beggars can't be choosers." WHO'S BEGGING?!

I am. I'm begging them to stop with the email forwards containing glamour shots ("The red velvet jacket looks fantastic, Mr. Choudhrey!") and bio data. Ugh, I don't care if he was at the top of his class in Karachi. So tonight this guy calls me and I can't even remember his freaking name but he's like, "Did you know someone from Atlanta would be calling you?"
"Umm, I thought someone from Chicago was calling me," I admitted. How many men had my mother given my cell number to? Is there an online graffiti board for desperate mothers with old maids as first daughters?
He laughed, "Well, maybe he will but it's me for now." OK, so far so good. This guy has a personality. Let's hope he just has one. Then he started talking and boy was he chatty. First he asked me about my trip to Paris and then spent about ten minutes explaining why it didn't matter if I wasn't caught up with how romantic the city was because the history and architecture I said I focused on instead was what really made it so romantic. Good point, I generously offered. I need a manicure. He kept talking and talking and, "That's where I put that book!" I thought to myself as I walked around my bedroom hoping this painful exercise in first exploratory conversations was winding down.

"You sound really tired," he said suddenly. How does he know what I sound like? I haven't been able to get a word in edgewise. I took the bait. "Yes," I yawned while saying, "It's been a long day." My mom hates it when I yawn-talk which I do frequently and usually when I'm talking to her. It must be a psychosomatic thing. OK, he said and then kept talking. He worked in IT, ooh how very F.O.B. of you! "But," he offered, "I'm really passionate about cars and would like to own my own dealership someday. Probably after I get green card." Cue needle scratching record player here. And. We're done.

Now I get to call my mom and tell her why this guy won't work out. Then, she'll tell me why all of my reasons are dumb and lecture me on making room in my life for love. Perfect. Because that's why I'm the love pariah, eligible men keep lining up to be rejected by me. That's it. And I wave them off because of all the great sex I'm not having with, oh that's right, NO ONE!

I'm touched

So many of you seem outraged at the idea of my early retirement. It's so earnest and sweet, my sardonic self keeps wondering if it's a big put-on. "Go on... no really, go on."
In addition to the comments posted here, I received a string of emails from friends who thought it was ridiculous that the threat of losing my anonymity would push me into the fringes of society. In other words, joining the ranks of the normal people who don't feel compelled to share their life via a blog.

I may be hitting the road again for work anyway, possibly limiting how much time I can allow my musings to take center stage. The break from all the travel has been a bit of a relief and I was looking forward to actually spending the last few weeks of 2006 in New York. I find out in a couple of days what exciting place I'll see next. Ann Arbor? I hear Fargo's nice this time of year. If it's the latter, I'll have to feign illness to keep from being shipped off to the Siberia of the western hemisphere. Actually, we never go to Fargo for anything. I've never heard of anyone, except a foreign medical grad, going to Fargo. God love him, that guy never knew what hit him. One minute he was headed to the "land of opportunity", the next he's seeing patients who are so accustomed to harsh winters they chuckle at frostbite, saying things like, "Go ahead and take that toe off, Doc. I've got nine more."

The ex-boyfriend is calling. He went to Tao for dinner and now wants me to meet him for coffee at his hotel. My first thought was, why the fuck did you go to Tao without me? Wouldn't an apology entail a nice dinner? Then I remembered what other lovely qualities he possessed in addition to his penchant for good wine, beer, rubbing alcohol... he's cheap! And apparently, that's a British export as well. I remember the time he lost his wallet in a New Orleans cab and missed his flight back to New York on the morning his father was travelling from Brussels to visit him. I got a panicked call pleading with me to pick him up at the airport or else the poor man would be lost. We were broken up at the time and the idea of being stuck in a cab to JFK on a beautiful Sunday wasn't a prospect I relished. "Fuck, Howard, do you really think he can't figure it out on his own?"
"No bloody chance, he's expecting me to pick him up and doesn't have a cell phone," he pleaded.
I relented. I was given this description: "He looks like my dad, you know an older version of me minus the devilishly handsome part." Great. I'm on the lookout for a man with an inflated sense of self-worth. Somehow, I found him and he was perturbed to say the least.
"That arse! I thought I raised him better than that. Probably got wankered, didn't he?" he demanded without any regard for the South Asian young woman who was clearly uncomfortable with everything his son had engineered to create her presence at this terminal on a beautiful freakin' Sunday!
"Umm, he lost his keys.." I stammered. This was beyond uncomfortable. We hailed a cab and got to Howard's apartment- a high rise in the date rape district, also known as Murray Hill where former frat boys abound. And Howard was so grateful for me sweeping in and rescuing his dear old dad that it took him three months to pay me back the $60 in cab fare. Nice. Maybe I won't be having coffee this evening.