The Worst Song To Serenade Somebody with

I’ve been gone from this site for over a year. Over the last year I have re-branded myself you might say. In the past my focus was on recovery from alcoholism. Now, I am expanding and showing even more of myself. I am not only an alcoholic but also am on the Autism spectrum. Last year I wrote a book of memoirs about what it was like to go through life not knowing I was on the Autism spectrum. Relationships were a mighty struggle for me. The focus of this blog will be giving you excerpts from my book. Ready? Here we go with the first entry.

The year was 1993 and it was late September in Newark, California, a neighboring city to Fremont where I was living at the time. My birthday falls on the 14th and this one takes place during a pizza date that my friend Natalie invited me on to celebrate my birthday. A lot of memories with women back in my twenties remind me of my ineptitude at dating. I just had it in my mind that I sucked when it came to women so when you operate with that frame of mind things will only be difficult. Now that I am happily married I am at peace because eventually I got to the place I wanted to be. But the road there was full of struggles and the point of struggles is to learn something about them. That is the point of rehashing my past, to see what I have learned from it.

So I had just turned twenty-two and my friend Natalie and I had turned a corner in our friendship. There was a sexual tension building between us that was palpable. We had knownn each other for years through other people. First she was good friends with Jean’s younger sister then she ended up becoming good friends with Jean. So over the years I spent a lot of time with her because of my friendship with Jean. For awhile I had the impression that Jean was into her so I never thought of her as somebody to pursue. As time went on nothing happened between them and eventually it got to the point where it was now fair to show an interest in her. Natalie and I started talking on the phone and getting to know each other better this way. Getting into the talking stage with women was always fun and I always enjoyed getting to know them but it always seemed to be a dead end street. Once we got talking we just stayed talking. We would talk about everything under the sun except we would never talk about how we felt about each other. So it’s a bittersweet subject for me. One day Natalie took action and asked me out to celebrate my birthday. We would go play pool and then have some pizza.

My walk over to the pool hall which was right next to the pizza place was about forty-five minutes. On my way there I was trying to figure out what her intentions were for me. I read it that she was into me and read it as a date so I was excited. A forty-five minute walk to a date is actually a pretty good thing because it gives you a lot of time to figure out how you feel about a woman. I liked her and I was most definitely interested in her at this point. I wonder if a lot of guys come up with game plans when they go out with a woman. If I am the one asking a woman on a date I have a plan as far as the activities go, what to do and what time to meet up but I never have a when will I make a move plan. I just always felt like that should come natural. I always figured when the time was right it would just happen. There would be a moment and we would both know it and then nature would take its course. I value genuineness and planning how and when to make a move does not seem genuine, it is too contrived for my taste.

We met up at the pool hall and played for awhile. At this place you rent a table for the hour and then play as many games as you want within that hour and when the time is up it’s up. We played an hour and all seemed to be going pretty well. I was really enjoying spending time with her alone. I prefer a lot of alone time when I am dating a woman. I do much better in one on one scenarios and get a greater sense of fulfillment from them than I do in group settings. I feel like I get lost in the shuffle in group settings and don’t connect very well individually. I get caught up as somebody’s listener but I am not really given the space to do much talking. This is how it has always been for me. After we played pool we walked across the parking lot just a bit and went to the pizza place.

At the pizza place we sat down and we were sitting right across from one another. All of a sudden with the pizza in between us guess what? She makes her move. With no musical accompaniment she decides to sing Whitney Houston, and not just any Whitney Houston song but the biggest love song of her career, I Will Always Love You. I got serenaded acapella to this song. For some reason all I can remember is her singing  the big hook and IIIIIIIIIIIIII will always love youuuuuu, uuuu, and IIIIIII will always love youuuu. Yes that part. This was the big moment. The moment I had been waiting for. She is across the table and I am looking into her big brown beautiful eyes just completely taken in by this moment. This is it! This is the point in the romantic movie where the guy and girl finally come closer and they give each other a big kiss. Okay, I’m ready, ah fuck there’s a pizza in the way! And she’s all the way on the other side of the table! God damn it! I got cockblocked by a pizza. Who gets cockblocked by a pizza? So I just sat there and waited for her to finish the song. And when she did I just said “that was nice.” What the hell? I completely and utterly just froze. The big moment came and went and that was that. 

When we were done eating pizza we went outside in the parking lot to say goodbye. I was feeling so awkward because I felt like that big moment had just passed me by. I was so uncomfortable that I just sped my way through the goodbyes and thanked her. I was demoralized. From that point on it was all downhill. We stayed friends but I just knew in my head that if it wasn’t going to happen then it just wasn’t going to happen. I gave up all hope that she and I would ever be a couple. I began to look for reasons why she would make a horrible girlfriend. And you know what? I found them. So by the time she actually brought up the conversation about whether or not I could see us as a couple which was some five months later I had already given up. I was done. 

She asked me if I could see us being together and I just said “it wouldn’t work out” and I think I just got nervous about the whole conversation so I said something really messed up and desperate. I said that I could see us having sex but not being together as a couple. I wish I would have kept that to myself. To make matters worse a few months after that she called to see how I was doing and she asked me if I was dating anybody. I said yes and explained that I had a new girlfriend. This confused her and she said “I thought you didn’t want a girlfriend.” Without thinking and just responding honestly and factually I said ” I never said that. I never said I didn’t want a girlfriend.” She said “Oh,just, me!” I said “yes” and she cried and said she had to go. God, I felt shitty. That went south really quick and I did not want to hurt her or intentionally be mean like that. I used to really like this girl. The feelings were far more than just sexual. She never knew that for a moment in time I wanted her but it just never happened. Raise your hand if you’ve ever been cockblocked by a pizza. That’s what I thought.

By the way I ended up looking up the lyrics to I will always love you recently and it’s just a crappy way to try and win somebody over. If you look closely at the lyrics it’s a damn break up song. It says we both know I’m not what you need. I don’t remember her singing that part of the song to me. Four years later a more appropriate song came out by Sixpence none the richer called kiss me. I think people should use that one as a make a move song.

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