Fake Dates

When I was a sophomore in college I went on my first Fake Date. It was with a techy theatre kid named Josh, who ended up becoming one of my favorite men on the whole planet. We sat in a coffee shop and talked for over 5 hours. Josh can talk. 5 hours is nothing.

He was kind of my first not so gay gay best friend. A guy who I temporarily fell madly in love with, who I often questioned in areas larger than his sexuality and who has been with me through thick and thin.

Josh attempted to break into my apartment on an evening of drama with some random ex who now bares little memory in the shadow of Josh, my Lancelot. He brought me a copy of "The Unbearable Lightness of Being," what has become my favorite book of all time and wrote a passage in the front that I still read anytime I start to doubt the beauty of the world.

He may have been the first and he is still one of the best but there have been quite a few fake dates since then, fake dates which always trump real ones.

I am a glutton for guy friends. No offense to my girl friends but I love, love, love a good night with the men in my life, shooting the shit about lord knows what, feeling loved and safe and comfortable in my skin.

I suck at dating. They all tell me this. I turn into girly Lyndsey, who is insecure and fragile and who would never rip them a new one the way their friend does.

"I hate it!!" I screamed at V over celebratory PBRs on our first Fake Date night since his return from the south pacific. (I think I broke his heart when I told him I had hit the threshold on my love of all things PBR - just goes to show all good things must end.)

"Why can't it be like this!! I want this - I mean not this but like this with sex."

But that right there is where a great fake date always takes a nose dive into crap. Meg Ryan may not have got it at first but the sex always gets in the way.

Rule number one: Don't let them fall in love with you. Rule number two: Don't fall in love with them.

If I could go back and keep those best guy friends who got all weird when tingly feelings got in the way I would do it in a heart beat. I miss them.

"Lyn, that is the risk you have to take." I could say who said this but it wouldn't matter. All of my fake date boys who have made it through the gauntlet of dating with me and have come out the other side all say the same thing. "Don't you want to find someone to be up to you knees in wing sauce with?"

"Eww." Wait, maybe I made the wing sauce comment and they said "eww". It is hard to remember at this point.

I love friendship. I love guys. They are great. I just haven't figured out how not to be a moron when you pull the fake label off of dating.