Dating notes: How young is too young? How wild is too wild? How free is too free?
I went to hear a funk group I really like--called Marvellous--over the weekend, at one of Paris' iconic jazz clubs (no, not the one featured in LalaLand, but the Sunset) with one of my BFFs who also really likes to funk out.
The group played three excellent sets. The club was super hot, due to being poorly ventilated. We are into Parisian summer with all its heat and humidity, so between sets we would all exit the steamy confines of the basement-level club to get some fresh air at street level.
Between the 2nd and 3rd set, we were hanging out outside the club, taking selfies, talking and laughing. Two young men, fellow concert-goers and one obviously the wingman, start hitting on us. Oh man they were good. There are some men who are just born to flirt, and these two dudes had the patter down. The wingman first asked if we were together (I guess two women in their 50s in a club = lesbians, or fodder for guys' lesbian fantasies) and when we said no, the cute one (non-wingman) asked me if I had "un mec" which means "a boyfriend." I told him no, that I'd just been dumped wah wah wah I'm so lonely and sad wah wah wah. This turned into a huge flirting game which had my friend and I just rolling our eyes (when the men weren't looking).
The set starts back up and we all descend back into the club. The group launches into one of the best jam sessions ever, chairs are pushed aside and everybody's up and dancing. You've got the room just feeling happy and connected---you know that thing that happens when everyone is groovin' to some fantastic sounds. The cute guy comes over to me and makes it clear we are meant to dance together. I'm all for this, despite the fact he is like 30. Hey, he's hot, he clearly thinks I'm hot, and it's just dancing. We dance, he buys me a Sex on the Beach (I remember the club tips I give my students: never take a drink you haven't seen poured) and he tells me he wants to take me to the next concert : Eric Bibb, who is a Delta Blues guy I absolutely love. I'm all yeah sure let's do it! He dials himself from my phone so he'll have my number and I'll have his. I don't think anything about this, because I figure he's drunk and hey I'm digging feeling young, wild and free. I'll just delete his number whenever.
Around 1 am my friend and I need to go home---my blisters, which were already bad from walking so much with M. a couple of nights earlier, are now so acute that I have to take off my shoes and walk barefoot to Hotel de Ville where I'm going to catch my bus. I feel like a character out of Les Miserables: no shoes and getting the dirtiest feet you can get walking Paris' medieval streets. But I'm also feeling like I'm 22---an age where I did need to walk home barefoot on more than one occasion, having either broken a shoe dancing, or....blisters from dancing.
I catch my bus and my phone buzzes. It's Guilhem, the child guy from the club. He's posted a pic of himself all sweaty from our dancing, and written "I'll call you." (I forgot to mention Guilhem grew up in New Orleans, so his English is like mine.) I text him back a photo of me (I forgot to mention I had the MOST FABULOUS strapless dress on this night, that made me look like Susan Sarandon) equally sweaty and disheveled. "YES!!!" I write, just fucking with him. He's drunk, I'm feeling 22, and let's just extend the flirting into the wee hours of the morning.
Me, that evening: Coo coo ca-choo, Mrs. Robinson.
You know where this is going, right?
[phone buzzes Monday, indicating incoming sms]
[boring texts deciding which club to go to]
Full disclosure: I'm posting this and not clear exactly how I feel about being this young, wild and free. This really is not "me," in the sense that such a scenario is far from what I imagined my post-Phil life to be. And dating a 32 year-old guy does not move me forward towards my goal of a real, solid and loving relationship, which I want to be in within a year's time. I do like, however, that I met this guy organically, i.e., not off the internet, and that was one of the things on my wishlist in terms of meeting men. If this guy were only 30 years older, I'd be all over this like white on rice. (Is that still something we can say?)
That said, this could be a fun memory to add to my brain's databank, one that I'd be delighted to pull out and share with my fellow geriatric friends when I'm sitting there in the Old Folk's Home.
P.S. The reference to "Kiss" is just very striking to me, as that song is the very first message Phil ever sent to me when he contacted me through match.com. He sent just that song. That's all. And with that, an entire 10-year story began.
The group played three excellent sets. The club was super hot, due to being poorly ventilated. We are into Parisian summer with all its heat and humidity, so between sets we would all exit the steamy confines of the basement-level club to get some fresh air at street level.
Between the 2nd and 3rd set, we were hanging out outside the club, taking selfies, talking and laughing. Two young men, fellow concert-goers and one obviously the wingman, start hitting on us. Oh man they were good. There are some men who are just born to flirt, and these two dudes had the patter down. The wingman first asked if we were together (I guess two women in their 50s in a club = lesbians, or fodder for guys' lesbian fantasies) and when we said no, the cute one (non-wingman) asked me if I had "un mec" which means "a boyfriend." I told him no, that I'd just been dumped wah wah wah I'm so lonely and sad wah wah wah. This turned into a huge flirting game which had my friend and I just rolling our eyes (when the men weren't looking).
The set starts back up and we all descend back into the club. The group launches into one of the best jam sessions ever, chairs are pushed aside and everybody's up and dancing. You've got the room just feeling happy and connected---you know that thing that happens when everyone is groovin' to some fantastic sounds. The cute guy comes over to me and makes it clear we are meant to dance together. I'm all for this, despite the fact he is like 30. Hey, he's hot, he clearly thinks I'm hot, and it's just dancing. We dance, he buys me a Sex on the Beach (I remember the club tips I give my students: never take a drink you haven't seen poured) and he tells me he wants to take me to the next concert : Eric Bibb, who is a Delta Blues guy I absolutely love. I'm all yeah sure let's do it! He dials himself from my phone so he'll have my number and I'll have his. I don't think anything about this, because I figure he's drunk and hey I'm digging feeling young, wild and free. I'll just delete his number whenever.
Around 1 am my friend and I need to go home---my blisters, which were already bad from walking so much with M. a couple of nights earlier, are now so acute that I have to take off my shoes and walk barefoot to Hotel de Ville where I'm going to catch my bus. I feel like a character out of Les Miserables: no shoes and getting the dirtiest feet you can get walking Paris' medieval streets. But I'm also feeling like I'm 22---an age where I did need to walk home barefoot on more than one occasion, having either broken a shoe dancing, or....blisters from dancing.
I catch my bus and my phone buzzes. It's Guilhem, the child guy from the club. He's posted a pic of himself all sweaty from our dancing, and written "I'll call you." (I forgot to mention Guilhem grew up in New Orleans, so his English is like mine.) I text him back a photo of me (I forgot to mention I had the MOST FABULOUS strapless dress on this night, that made me look like Susan Sarandon) equally sweaty and disheveled. "YES!!!" I write, just fucking with him. He's drunk, I'm feeling 22, and let's just extend the flirting into the wee hours of the morning.
Me, that evening: Coo coo ca-choo, Mrs. Robinson.
You know where this is going, right?
[phone buzzes Monday, indicating incoming sms]
[boring texts deciding which club to go to]
Full disclosure: I'm posting this and not clear exactly how I feel about being this young, wild and free. This really is not "me," in the sense that such a scenario is far from what I imagined my post-Phil life to be. And dating a 32 year-old guy does not move me forward towards my goal of a real, solid and loving relationship, which I want to be in within a year's time. I do like, however, that I met this guy organically, i.e., not off the internet, and that was one of the things on my wishlist in terms of meeting men. If this guy were only 30 years older, I'd be all over this like white on rice. (Is that still something we can say?)
That said, this could be a fun memory to add to my brain's databank, one that I'd be delighted to pull out and share with my fellow geriatric friends when I'm sitting there in the Old Folk's Home.
P.S. The reference to "Kiss" is just very striking to me, as that song is the very first message Phil ever sent to me when he contacted me through match.com. He sent just that song. That's all. And with that, an entire 10-year story began.