Define:Date

I'm pretty sure I haven't had a date in over a year. I've fallen out of the habit of writing in my journal each night, after having the journal lost in storage for a year, so I don't have documentary evidence. But I'm pretty sure it's been over a year. And I haven't had a serious date—one that I felt would be followed by a repeat performance—since long before leaving Tucson. Maybe six months before leaving Tucson!

Now I have seen one guy a couple of times. But let me tell you what doesn't constitute a date. If you e-mail me and ask me how to fix something on your computer, and it's the first time I've heard from you in, oh, a month, and I offer to come over and fix your computer for you, that's not a date. Or if you e-mail to ask if I'd like to come over to see your condo, and I offer to stop and pick up dinner—because we both have to eat, right?—as you are temporarily disabled after knee surgery, and you don't offer to repay me for dinner or even chip in to defray expenses, that's also not a date.

A date is when you call me on the phone and ask if I'd like to meet for coffee or a drink or a meal or a movie, and you pick up the check without even questioning it. That's a date.

The key ingredient? You, the guy, taking action. You call. You ask. You pay. Those actions signify your seriousness, your integrity.

I don't need to be picked up in this day of geographic diversity; I'm happy to meet you someplace. But, Darlin', you gotta ask. You gotta have the [omitting all crude synonyms here] guts to risk rejection by calling me and asking me out.

In the absence of your action, my action will be to [happily] sit home, knitting and watching whatever is on the television!