Rule #27

Dating Lesson #27: For every good date, there are 13 equal and opposite awful dates.

Maybe life is different for those who are okay with following certain social codes like the whole three date rule. Date one: Kiss. Date Two: Make Out. Date Three: Get your freak on. Inevitably this code means you are meeting someone’s unmentionables long before their parents…or even before you know what their favorite color is.

Obviously, my beliefs and my irrational fear of physical touch make this code my worst nightmare. But just because I am swimming against the dating current, doesn’t mean that everyone else is, and it certainly doesn’t mean the guys I find myself sitting across from enjoying a meal on a first date, agree (or in some cases have even heard) with the idea of ‘waiting’.

My friends and I have created a system that would make Dewey question his decimals in order to keep all of the guys straight. I get it…it sounds like I date a lot, which is untrue. There are simply a lot of small lessons learned, many before a date even actually takes place. Our naming system is pretty detailed. We name them arbitrarily based on what we remember most. This scientific method has produced the following characters: creepy, pickles, tiny, Socrates, thuglife and “I’m going to punch that guy in the face” (he had a name once…it was stripped from him due to some emotional complications he created).

In college, it was rare to date someone you knew nothing about. Typically, you had mutual friends and even knew the guy well before your first one-on-one happened. Nowadays, it’s like flying blind into a sexual battlefield. Enter: Creepy.

Creepy is a classic example of giving people a chance. My idea of a first date is dinner and a delightful conversation filled with witty banter from about 5 feet away. You can’t be too careful. Modern day birth control is sketchy at best; abstinence and a healthy respect of personal bubbles are my cup of tea (ignore the fact that a male within 2 feet of my person makes my entire body break into a sweat that looks like I just ran a marathon…in the rainforest). Creepy’s first date idea is a cordial how-do-you-do followed by a handshake and then a romp in the sack (followed by post hanky-panky drinks and a light discussion of your childhood, of course…he isn’t a caveman).

Clearly, Creepy and I weren’t on the same page, which was evident by the pool of sweat I was sitting in by the end of the night as I watched my personal bubble slowly dwindle into nothing.  Besides the guy I fell into when I tripped the other day, I haven’t touched a guy in like seven months , and this guy certainly wasn’t going to be cause me to break my hiatus. I believe the Heisman I was forced to give him towards the end of our delightful evening may have given him the hint…that and the 30 minute explanation I had to provide as to why my pants were still firmly in place.

We were called to be in the world, but not of it. We measure so many things on a different scale than those around us, our sexual lives are no different. When most people are hitting home runs within the first month, it is bound to draw some attention when your idea of a home run is a forehead kiss and snuggling on the couch while watching a good action flick, and if you are feeling a bit risky, turning the lights off (scandalous, right?!).

So get your G-rated Christian snuggle on. You know the one I’m talking about, curl up with a wholesome individual, keep some room for Jesus in there, enjoy a great conversation about whether Chris Tomlin or Jeremy Camp make better summer camp worship leaders, decide what kind of pie you are going to bake together on your 3^rd date, giggle profusely if you get a forehead kiss and then call your friends to discuss the waffle vs pancake handholding that went on.