Hazel

In 2004, I joined an up-and-coming dating site called OkCupid. The best thing about OkCupid was that it was 100% free.

That was a price that worked quite well with my budget. At the time, I still hadn’t found the job I have now. I did, however, have a shitty mail room job at a faceless corporation.

Actually, the corporation wasn’t faceless – the CEO (and company namesake) could be seen walking around the office all the time. The dude was kind of a dick. Well, actually he was kind of friendly, but I say he’s a dick because, with a college degree, I was making $16,000 a year schlepping manila envelopes from office to office 40 hours a week. And this company’s main area of business was increasing the morale at other companies. Ironic, huh?

But I digress…

At the time, as a single guy, free definitely fit in my budget. So I joined this site (at the suggestion of a friend) and started contacting people. One of them was named Hazel.

Hazel was about a year younger than me and had just graduated from college with a double-major in museum studies and art history. Hazel had a plan that involved getting a job at a reputable museum and working there forever. That sounded to me like a pretty lofty goal, until I found out that Hazel’s family was pretty darn wealthy, and her dad was very well-connected.

Hazel would find that job, eventually. But in the mean time, she was, just like Alicia, living with her folks.

At the time, Hazel and I both lived near St. Louis, so we went to the Forest Park Balloon Race for our first date. When we met up, I discovered that Hazel had brought her best friend, Terri, who I happened to know. Terri went to college with me and often hung out with some members of my circle of friends. A very odd coincidence if I do say so myself. But, at the same time, a very fortunate occurrence, since Hazel was painfully shy, and this way, at least we would both have someone to talk to.

The date went well, and we made plans for a second outing the following week.

We met up at a Mexican restaurant, where we proceeded to engage in awkward conversation for about 45 minutes.

And then I became ill. Physically ill. Rush-to-the-restroom ill. Something wasn’t quite right about the nachos I had ordered. Something was undercooked. And I had ingested it. And it wanted out. Now.

Apparently, whatever was wrong with my nachos was also wrong with her quesadilla, as she also had to make a rushed visit to the restroom.

As far as dates go, this was definitely not in my top three.

Pale, weak, and a bit dehydrated, we both made our way out of the restaurant as fast as we could, agreeing that maybe this wasn’t a good idea. However, the meaning of the word “this” was a bit muddled. For me, it was the restaurant choice (which, for the record, was her preferred eatery). For her, it was the date itself. And she was right. We had very little in common – she wanted to talk about art. And only art. She asked me what artists I liked. I conceded that I only knew of five artists – Monet, Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael Sanzio, Donatello, and Michelangelo. I knew Monet because my mother dragged me to a Monet exhibit at our local art museum when I was younger. The other four I knew because they were the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. She did not find this humorous.

I asked her what sort of art was her favorite, which apparently is like asking a mother which of her children she loves the most. That question earned me a cold stare, so I quickly changed the subject.

“So, what do you do for fun?” I asked.

“Oh, my friends and I like to go out to restaurants and the occasional bar,” she said.

“Oh yeah?” I continued, sensing this was going somewhere. “You mean like in the Loop?” I asked, referring to St. Louis’ University City Loop – a vibrant entertainment district very close to where she lived.

“No,” she said, “We (not sure if she meant her group of friends or if she was using the Royal We) find The Loop to be juvenile. We much prefer the CWE,” she said, referring to the Central West End, a more upscale entertainment and shopping district a few miles east of The Loop. Snobbery in action.

And that’s when the illness forced us to excuse ourselves from the table, thank heavens.

As I mentioned, that was our last date, which is a good thing, since there was very little compatibility.

A few years later, I posted a personal ad on Craigslist (a loaded subject I’ll get to at a later date) and woman a few years younger than myself responded to it. When I replied to her e-mail, she wrote back and asked, “Did you go on a couple of dates with girl named Hazel in 2004?”

I responded that yes, I had, and asked if she happened to know Hazel. Within seconds, I had another e-mail from her in my inbox, and in six words, I knew I never had a chance with this girl.

"Hazel is my sister. No thanks."