I don’t go on dates with strangers anymore. I swore to myself since that day to never go out with a stranger, a man that’s not my friend. A man I’ve not talked to. A man I can’t carry a conversation with. I swore to myself since then to never give such men a chance. How then, are you going to know a man if you don’t go out with them first, Zipporah?
How do people get familiar with you? Someone actually asked me that question when I declined going out on a coffee date with them because I don’t go on dates with people I’m not familiar with. I thought it was a valid question so I went on to explain to them why that’s how I choose to approach dates with men.
From a woman’s perspective, life is different and not as safe as it is for men. Men can afford to loiter at night without their buds. A woman doesn’t have that luxury. It doesn’t matter how she’s dressed, it gets uncomfortable real quick if you’re spotted as a female out in the dark. Daytime is no exception either.
There’s just something about the way of things and how women get treated but that’s a discussion for another day. Same goes for the conversation about how men are meant to get familiar with me without going on dates with them first. Also, the current/modern dating styles don’t apply to me. I’m old-fashioned.
Most importantly, I am very serious about my walk with Christ and principles. I do not compromise. Not for fun, likes or any other reason people come up with to compromise their faith and principles these days.
Now? Let’s go back to that creepy first date and why I’ll never go out with a man I’m unfamiliar with. There was this man—I refrain from referring to him as a gentleman because of his uncultured choice for a first date—who invited me for a coffee date. It was sudden and unexpected. I refrained from holding back and saying no because I say ‘no’ many times. So, I was like let me give a yes once in a while, a choice I regretted later on, deeply.
I never meet people away from spaces I’m familiar with, especially if I’m not on a good friendship basis with them. This guy was no exception.
First and foremost, he didn’t keep time. He had me lurking at a certain building stalling like a mongoose on the railway. Things that don’t go well with my reputation. Stood there for a very long time, I almost turned and went back home. I wish I had taken that as my sign that my time was about to be horrifyingly wasted. He came late. We went to get coffee, he decided we would pick the coffee to-go and drive around instead.
A drive? For a first date? At night? I was terrified. But then, I told my nerves, relax hun, you’re overthinking this. Nothing bad is going to happen. I thought it would be a straight drive on a straight road. It was until it wasn’t. (I need to check my journal for in-time feelings for this one because I had to journal all of it when I returned home. It was THAT scary!)
He had the audacity to branch off from the main road (y’all this was a man I don’t know, he was not my friend and this was supposed to be a random first date…how do y’all do this dating business at night? Geez!) into a dark feeder road alley. When I tell you my heart was not in the car with us, I mean it. I left it at that turn we made before we got on the dark dirt road. It was too dark to make out anything clearly.
During the day, you can tell it’s not the worst neighborhood. At night though, the place turned into a whole horror movie. With only the headlights on, and this man driving and yapping…doing ‘his’ what I would like to think was his once in a while “dose of emotional dumping”, I was beside myself. I held tight on the car door lock. Promising myself one thing and one thing only, if this man tried anything with me, I was ready and willing to click that lock open and throw myself on the dirt road. Moving car and all.
I didn’t care! I was too shaken up. Too worried for myself. And I could tell this man didn’t get people listening to him express himself and his worries, stuff like that. That or the fact that he loved to hear himself talk. Either way, I wouldn’t mind so much if he didn’t put me in a life-threatening ambience to do it. What in the first date was that?!
Anyway, we kept on the dark dirt road alley…bumpy and rough, zigzagging, the wheel running out of his hands…I shook. He drove creepily slow. I still wondered how the wheel kept escaping out of his hands. Is that a car thing? The slower y’all drive, the faster the wheel runs out of y’all’s hands? Somebody needs to tell me.
If this man were to try and kill me, I wasn’t going down without a fight. It was him or me. And I knew for certain, it wasn’t me. I was going back to my family. In one piece, I could have been torn apart but I was going back to my home; parents, sisters and one brother, all of whom love me to death.
He drove and drove and drove…longest dirt road ride I’ve ever been on. Goodness gracious me! I thought it was almost over, that he would make a turn and take me back home, but when he had taken the ‘old dirt road’ long enough, the guy had the nerve to hit the main road and park on the side of the road where the cars zoomed past us at the most dangerous speed I ever saw.
Truth? I thought about opening that car door and walking from that free way back home. It would take forever but I’d get home eventually. Patience was running thin but mostly my mind was wildly racing with all thoughts of survival. The guy didn’t pick a thing. He didn’t know how to read a room. Obviously, he was emotionally immature.
I gave him every chance to redeem himself. I sat. I listened. I breathed. I waited. Nothing. He just went on and on and on and on and on about himself and the dreams he has. A date is not just about one person, right? It’s supposed to be about the two people who’ve met, right? Y’all need to tell me! Anyway, after he had talked himself away, he thought it best to drive me back home. Something that was overdue in my opinion.
My family was already worried about me. It wasn’t supposed to take that long. It wasn’t that good to have lasted that long. They were fighting the urge to call. So they texted. A lot. I responded to each but minimally because it’s etiquette to pay attention to whoever you’re meeting or are out on a date with. It’s polite. I wish I had lost my manners then and called calvary!!! Because what in the creepy first date was that?
He drove us back ever so slowly! Did I mention that it was at that same speed he took me through the old dark dirt road? No? Well, it was at that same speed. Was he looking for the darkest spot to hide my body once he was done with me? You might call it overthinking. I’m just a girl. I’m a woman. Ring a bell? I was mad. I was scared. I was all things, mixed with horrified feelings, anger and anxiety. He proceeded at an unusually slow speed to drive me back home.
I wanted to jump out of the car once we got there. Joke was on me. When we arrived at our house gate, that man had the nerve not to hoot the car horn to get the attention of those inside. He stopped the car. Turned off the lights. Turned off the car engine bringing the slow guitar in the background (I’ll not mention what type of music he was playing. I don’t want any identifiers of this guy…you might hunt him down…I forgave him…even though I still shake on the inside each time I think about what he did) to a sudden halt and end on to talk some more.
Ugh! I wanted to tear the short strands of my colored hair out. Why was he still talking to me? I hadn’t shared a word about myself or my dreams the entire time, he just kept going on and on and on and on about himself.
I texted my sisters to come to the gate and open and pick me up or better yet rescue me because apparently if this wasn’t cut short by some miraculous intervention, I was to sleep in this man’s car. My sisters, the gems they are, came through and violá the creepy first date ended thus. It wasn’t supposed to last that long. I will never go on a date with a stranger ever again.
Ps: The coffee was terrible. It singed my tongue. Worst coffee I’ve ever had and coffee date I’ve ever been on! I’m not even a coffee person. I mentioned this earlier and still he bought me coffee. Some people are weird. And deaf apparently.
