I Take It Harvard Doesn’t Teach Any Classes In Common Sense

Do you remember back in the day, we’re talking late 90s/early 00s, when VH1’s “Behind the Music” was all the rage? I can hear the narrator’s voice now. I spent many a Saturday and Sunday afternoon on my couch watching back to back marathons, when really each band’s story followed the same narrative arc. The band met in some podunk town, became best friends and soul mates, went to the big city, and hit it big. With success came drug addictions, alcoholism, and adultury (so dramatic). Unable to cope with success the band begins to hate each other, puts out terrible albums destined for the bargain bin at Camelot music (ahh, the days of actual music stores), splits up, only to spend all their money on car collections and, you know, drugs. Eventually they find redemption through AA, religion, or the need for some cash, and then new success, success they can really enjoy – a reunion tour, new contract, new album, and a brand new Vegas show. Yes, the band’s back together.

The same pattern can be said for relationships. You meet, which is hopefully a good story, start to date, the honeymoon period ensues, possible commitment, complaceteness, weight gain, constant arguing, break up, and then…acceptance. Okay, well that’s one kind of relationship. For those of you who have read my earlier postings, I’m sure you read the post about Mark the cat guy and thought, “How on earth did she date that guy?” I have to admit, I’m still at a loss for words, however, I think it is time I explain myself. Ladies and gentlemen, this is the the Story Behind the Relationship: Mark the Lawyer Edition.

How It Happened

Memorial Day weekend 2007. My friend Laura, a DC native, temporarily moved back to town for a summer associate position at a prominent DC law firm. She called me around 3:00 on Thursday and asked if I wanted to come to a summer associate happy hour at a Dupont bar. Why of course! People to meet, things to do. I expected to have a drink or two, engage in some awkward chit chat with law students (maybe look for some cute ones), and then have a lovely dinner out with Laura and her boyfriend, Jake.

Things did not really go as planned. First, a public service announcement to all you young singletons out there: If you have not already, find yourself a friend who is a summer associate at a law firm. I had no idea this world existed. I show up at this bar, and the summer associate coordinator literally handed me a bucket of Coronas. For free. I was practically part of their recruitment set up. “Join our practice and we’ll have a talkative redhead show up at the bar unannounced and make small talk with you. You might even think you have a chance with her.” (Hmm…maybe I could make this a side business venture.) Okay, so yes, free booze, but the second, and more important benefit, ugly girls. Okay, I hate to call anyone ugly (who am I to judge?), but I will say that most of these women were not attractive or friendly. In fact, some of them just kind of snarled at me, like going to pet a dog and it tries to bite your hand. Well, I guess I didn’t want to talk to you anyway then. There are very few times in my life where I have felt confident enough to say this, but I do know Laura and I were by far the hottest girls there. And she had a boyfriend – Instant Wingman! If you are just half way attractive, like to smile a lot, and can hold a conversation – you are likely to do well in this environment.

Ok, so there I am with Laura, bored out of my mind, yet enjoying my free booze and making chit chat with frigid school marms and a couple of dorky guys. Next thing I know, a very cute lawyer starts talking to us. Well hello there. His name is Mark. He’s from the west coast. Harvard undergrad, Yale law. Swam and rowed at Harvard. Owns a condo in DC. Sixth year associate. Democrat.

And….He’s Into Me.

So much so, in fact, that Laura smartly takes her cue and makes herself scarce. We chat for most of the night (while getting extremely intoxicated), and he asked for my number and made it clear he planned to call.

Of course, I woke up the next morning going, “Wait, did that really happen? Did that guy really talk to me for that long? Whatever, it’s me, I’m sure I’ll never hear from him.”

Sure enough, he called the next week. We talked for over an hour. We had a first date, and a couple of days later, a second one, and then a third one. You see the pattern here. I was beside myself and completely taken aback. Wait, is this really happening? There’s just no way.

Oh my God – is my dating karma finally paying off? Is this guy for real? After all the losers, deadbeats, and worthless individuals, could this really successful, really attractive guy actually like me? Shut. Up.

I’ll admit there was something really nice and braggy about it all. (I made sure that the last guy I dated, who was just God awful, found out that I as dating a Harvard and Yale educated lawyer. It was a great F You.) I ran into my friend Jill on the metro while I was on my way home to get ready for our fourth date. “So what are you doing tonight?” “I actually have a date.” “Oh, really? With whom?” “Oh, this lawyer I met.” “Oooohh, where did he go to law school?” “Yale.” “Whoa, where did he go for undergrad?” “Harvard.” “What?! Where did you find him?” “Oh, just a law firm happy hour – really, they’re quite the gold mine. Did I mention he swam and was on the crew team at Harvard?” I remember Jill saying to me that I was “living the dream” finally the nice girl got the guy she deserved.

I started to think, maybe she was right. He kept asking me out, and then shockingly enough, would ask me out again. I honestly just kept waiting for him to stop calling, because that’s usually what would happen if something seemed to good to be true. However, that never happened. Instead, I got a little blinded by his resume.

See, this guy looked great on paper, no scratch that, fantastic. The best schools, top of his class, great job, not in politics – how refreshing to ask someone about their day and not have to sound like MSNBC commentator wannabes (or should I say “Democratic or Republican strategists”). I was so blinded by his resume that I couldn’t see that he just didn’t really work in real life. I seemed to avoid the red flags.

Yes, red flags. I said it. Like most past relationships, I now look back on all of this and I’m just going, “What was I thinking?” It’s like finding a picture of yourself from a few years ago and saying, “What was I wearing? Really? Did I think that was attractive? Was I blind?” Yes, you were, but it also seemed to make sense at the time . (Hey, people thought stirrup pants were cool at one point. You weren’t the only one.) Laura and Jake tried to stage an intervention. Several times. “We just don’t think he’s good enough for you.” “That’s so easy for you to say. You have no idea what it’s like to date in the real world.” This is coming from two people who drunkenly hooked up their first day of law school, woke up the next morning and immediately decided to be boyfriend-girlfriend. They are now engaged. True story.

However, maybe Laura and Jake had a point.

First of all, man couldn’t dress. In fact, he managed to violate all of my male clothing rules – my list of, “I don’t care if you are my soul mate. I cannot touch you if you wear the following:” list. Yes, the possibility of having an Ivy League educated lawyer boyfriend made me throw it all, and my common sense, out the window.

Now I know this stuff doesn’t matter, and really, it’s what’s on the inside that counts, but I’m sorry, there is no excuse for black….pleated…..cuffed…..pants. Yes, they were practically AC Slater pants, just a little bit lower waisted and a lot less acid wash. He also had a penchant for golf shirts. Now this would be fine if they were plain with maybe just a Polo or Lacoste logo on them. However, he was all about…designs. Yes, there was more of an all over patterned theme going on. Bill Cosby would have looooved these golf shirts. (hence why I still refer to them as “Bill Cosby Golf Shirts”). So black pleated cuffed pants combined with Bill

Just imagine this lovely ensemble in the form of a golf shirt. It exists.

Cosby golf shirt, plus hair gelled and combed, possibly slicked, all the way to the side, oh and a big flashy gold watch (He got a deal at the outlets. Um, there’s a reason it made it to the outlets. I’m a champion bargain shopper, so I’m allowed to say that.) Yeah, all he needed was a GC (gold chain, people) and he’d be a pool shark lost on the golf course.

Second, he had a cat. Yes, y’all are already well aware of the cat. (Yes, this cat.) I’m a dog person. I hate cats. I’ll admit, I thought it was weird when I walked into his place the first time and he had not one, but two, cat trees. Yeah, those gray shag carpeted things that make someone’s home look instantly look like they own a bedzzler and a windsuit. Even worse, I noticed on his fridge he had magnets. Yes, cat magnets. Not magnet. Magnets. The first time I saw them, I laughed, “Ha ha! You have kitty cat magnets! What are you seven?” “Oh, uh, my mom put those up there.”

And this brings me to the third red flag – Mommy Dearest. This guy was an only child. I am not an only child, and frankly, I’m highly suspicious of only children. (No offense, to any only children reading this. I’m sure you are lovely people.) These people never learned to share. They also have had two parents obsess over their every move their entire lives. I never met his mother, he just told me she was the “cutest, sweetest, nicest woman I would ever meet.” I imagine her being like the grandmother babysitter from Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter’s Dead – being so sweet and nice to her baby boy while eating girls like me for breakfast. She decorated his apartment, did his laundry when she visited, gave him cat magnets, cat books

This lady from Goonies scared the crap out of me when I was little. I would totally be Corey Feldman if he ever left his mother alone with me. For Sure.

(Yes, I already mentioned “Chicken Soup for the Cat Lover’s Soul” once on this blog. Must I do it again?), it was like he was eight years old. One time I walked into his place to find this massive lace doily laid out, no, displayed, on his coffee table. Um, are you an 80 year old grandma? What is that? “Oh, it’s an old family heirloom. My Mom sent it to me.” Of course she did. Because all 30 year old bachelors love to put lace doilies around the house next to their copy of “Chicken Soup for the Cat Lover’s Soul”. If he wasn’t there, I would have thought the owner of this condo was a cat lady who watched Judge Judy. No doubt.

I will say the biggest red flag of all probably should have been when I brought up the dreaded “relationship” conversation…after four months of dating. Again – four months, not four days, or even four weeks. I still think I was perfectly in my bounds to say, hey, I think we should maybe have job titles now like “boyfriend” and “girlfriend”. You would have thought I asked him to marry me. It was awful. His way of making feel better about it was to say this, “Look, my ex-girlfriend was beautiful, and smart, and gorgeous, and every guy I know would have married her, and I still broke up with her.” Wow, I feel so much better now. (I also used to make excuses for when he would use reasoning like this to justify his actions. Look, he went to Harvard and Yale. He may be smart, but he’s socially retarded. It happens.)

I tried to end it the next day, he apologized, profusely, and I, sadly, accepted it and stayed with him for another two months, sans commitment. Yeah, I was that girl who thought she didn’t really want a relationship either, and could probably get the guy to change his mind anyway. It was a hard lesson to learn, but thankfully, two months later, I gave him the ultimatum, he balked, and I left. The weird thing was that I never cried once, when I’m normally quite the emotional basket case. I think by then I realized I was sick of the Bill Cosby golf shirts, the Mom issues, the weird bizarre obsession with his cat, and not being with someone who wanted to say I was his girlfriend.

Several months later, he emailed me wanting to meet up. We met for lunch. While what ensued will surely be another post (it’s just that good), the next day he emailed me the following:

great to have lunch yesterday – I’m glad to be back in the swing of things finally in DC and we should definitely do that again another time. Congrats on your success – sounds like a perfect fit for you, but it will never surprise me to find out that you are kickin some serious ass with your job or whatever you are doing. 🙂 You looked great. Take care,

Mark

I so won.